Voyager 1 crosses Solar System, enters interstellar space

September 21, 2013

Voyager 1 became the first man-made object to cross the Solar System and enter into interstellar space on August 25, 2012. The space probe is at a distance of more than 19 billion km from the Sun.

What is Voyager 1?

Voyager 1 is a space probe launched by NASA in 1977 alongside its identical sister probe Voyager 2 to study the outer Solar System and the interstellar medium – the physical space within a galaxy not occupied by stars or their planetary systems.

Salient facts about Voyager 1:

Flew by Jupiter in 1979 and Saturn in 1980, concluding its primary mission and became the first spacecraft to transmit detailed images of the two planets and their moons.
In 1990, 9.6 billion km from Earth, it turned around and clicked the entire Solar System.
Since then it has been flying toward the edge of the Solar System at some 17 km/s, surrounded by a hot ‘sea’ of charged particles called plasma.
Crossed the heliopause and entered interstellar space on August 25, 2012.

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