Slashdot Mirror
Voyager 1 Crosses The Termination Shock
SubstormGuy writes "In a scientific session at the AGU meeting in New Orleans this morning, Dr. Ed Stone presented clear evidence that Voyager 1 crossed the termination shock last December. The scientists in the room applauded when the announcement was made."
It absolutely will not stop, ever, until you are dead.
The wikipedia entry claims that The Voyager I spacecraft is believed to have passed termination shock in February 2003.
I'd do it, but my wiki privileges have been revoked temporarily. I can't imagine why.
...voyager fans, unsure what "termination shock" exactly means, start raising donations "just in case".
The first link doesn't go anywhere useful. This link brings up the correct results for the session. You can also view the session details.
I am shocked I say -- SHOCKED -- to hear this news.
And excited.
The geek in me is excited about 2005. Methane oceans, rovers on Mars and private spaceflight? There's a lot that's scary going on in the world today. But when it comes to SPACEFLIGHT -- 2005 is shaping up to be a banner year!
Kudos to the Voyager team!
I would have to say that explosives are the most abused technology in all of history.
While it's there, I'll send it a message to have a look around... I think that's where I left my sunglasses.
No, no sig. Really.
ThePromenader
Worlds grow old and suns grow cold
And death we never can doubt.
Time's cold wind, wailing down the past,
Reminds us that all flesh is grass
And history's lamps blow out.
But the Eagle has landed; tell your children when.
Time won't drive us down to dust again.
Cycles turn while the far stars burn,
And people and planets age.
Life's crown passes to younger lands,
Time brushes dust of hope from his hands
And turns another page.
But the Eagle has landed; tell your children when.
Time won't drive us down to dust again.
But we who feel the weight of the wheel
When winter falls over our world
Can hope for tomorrow and raise our eyes
To a silver moon in the opened skies
And a single flag unfurled.
But the Eagle has landed; tell your children when.
Time won't drive us down to dust again.
We know well what Life can tell:
If you would not perish, then grow.
And today our fragile flesh and steel
Have laid our hands on a vaster wheel
With all of the stars to know
That the Eagle has landed; tell your children when.
Time won't drive us down to dust again.
From all who tried out of history's tide,
Salute for the team that won.
And the old Earth smiles at her children's reach,
The wave that carried us up the beach
To reach for the shining sun.
For the Eagle has landed; tell your children when.
Time won't drive us down to dust again.
(c) 1975 - Leslie Fish
I want a new world. I think this one is broken.
Anyone care to give a better explanation of termination shock? How hot does it get there? Can the sensors onboard obtain more information of this phenomenon? The wikipedia article doesn't go into too much detail.
The real question is when will it return to threaten earth as part of a destructive alien entity? and will Kirk, Spock and the gang be ready to save us?
sorry 'bout the mess...
The link in the topic post is bunk.
Yep, had no idea what it was (so much for my Space Geek Badge)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Termination_shock
<i>In astronomy, the termination shock is theorised to be a boundary marking one of the outer limits of the sun's influence. It is where the bubble of solar wind particles slows down to below supersonic speed and heats up due to collisions with the galactic interstellar medium. It is believed to be about 100 Astronomical Units from the Sun.
The termination shock boundary fluctuates in its distance from the sun as a result of fluctuations in solar flare activity i.e. changes in the ejections of gas and dust from the sun.
The Voyager I spacecraft is believed to have passed termination shock in December 2004.</i>
A slashdotting - you get the stick first and then the carrot !
/cygdrive/d/home>units /* there and back */
You have: 100 au
You want: light years
* 0.0015812845
/ 632.39726
You have: 0.0015812845 years * 2
You want: hours
* 27.722488
/ 0.036071799
Anagram("United States of America") == "Dine out, taste a Mac, fries"
I have been intermittently following the voyager program with some interest. Much more detail is available at the NASA JPL website, including transcripts of communication efforts with the spacecraft, as well as info about the program and the spacecraft themselves. It's quite the interesting story, given that the program was never expected to continue as long as it has.
Imagine sending info across millions of light years with technology built in 1970s...
Ahhh..
You know about the secret 8-track installation on Voyager too, huh?
Thanks for playing, AC! but why not check some of the manifests for Shuttle flights; and whether the astronauts have security clearances; etc. The notion that NASA is "entirely civilian" is
Cool indeed. I can't help but wonder what Carl Sagan would think of this if he were around to see it happen....Sadly we have only his past eloquence to ponder and we are now left to our own devices in order to comprehend the magnitude of this event. We are now an interstellar species. The first ever on Earth and the only one we know of. There is no turning back now. Though perhaps it is time for Voyager to turn back, one last time to send us an image of ourselves from the incomprehensible beyond. Our planet will of course not be visible anymore, and our sun will probably appear as a mere unremarkable dot among a thousand others.
- "Hear that?! The percolations are imminent! Cease your ingress!"
the bbc http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/sci/tech/4576623.stm has some more info on this. You should know that they are not 100% it has crossed the termintation shock. "Some researchers thought the probe had arrived at the shock; others thought it still had some way to go. Now, at the 2005 Joint Assembly meeting organised by the American Geophysical Union, space scientists say they are confident - and agreed - that Voyager has gone beyond the termination shock and is flirting with deep space. Predicting the location of the termination shock was hard, the researchers say, because the precise conditions in interstellar space are unknown. Also, changes in the speed and pressure of the solar wind cause the termination shock to expand, contract and ripple. The most persuasive evidence that Voyager 1 has crossed the termination shock is its measurement of a sudden increase in the strength of the magnetic field carried by the solar wind, combined with an inferred decrease in its speed. This happens whenever the solar wind slows down."
I am totally depressed by my inability to make a Star Trek: The Motion Picture joke.
Just goes to show that maybe a source that ANYONE can stick any random crap into might not be the most reliable.
Not really, in this case it showed that an article that's out of date may not be correct. I mean, the new information was just now announced. To clarify, these articles now seem to be correct according to my source, and read:
- "Scientists at the Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Lab believe that Voyager entered the termination shock in February 2003."
- "Evidence presented at the AGU meeting in New Orleans in May 2005 by Dr. Ed Stone suggests that the Voyager I spacecraft passed termination shock in December 2004."
Beware: In C++, your friends can see your privates!
Is anyone else frustrated when you hear wonderful science like this being done, yet see that probes like this are slated to have their funding cut (http://www.spacedaily.com/news/voyager1-05a.html) ? For some reason, $4.2 million / year to operate them (ie, listen) seems unbelievably cheap for such a unique resource - not only are there only TWO probes out there (voyager 1 and 2), but to get others out to replace them would cost a whole ton more. ...In addition to having to wait another 20 or so years to get there. :(
Science just doesn't work when politics gets involved...
For those who want to know what a termination shock looks like: Clicky.
..before it finds the machine planet, and begins the long journey home.
Hey, it was out out date info, but it's still better than an old hard bound 'World Book Encyclopedia'...
plus, this post has been up for less than a day and someone updated it...pretty good i'd say
Thank you Dave Raggett
Except the solar wind slows down due to it 'running in to' interstellar particles. Larger objects are less affected by these subatomic particles, and can keep much more of their momentum.
Likewise, a solar sail isn't like a nautical sail. Once the momentum has been imparted, you need to apply energy to SLOW it down. On a sailboat, when the wind stops, the friction with the water slows you down. In interstellar space, when you don't have any solar 'wind' to power you, you just keep going...
I also have a problem with the use of the term 'subsonic'. When there is no medium for sound waves to travel in, how do you define 'subsonic'? (I don't mean you personally, I mean the schmuck that decided to use that term in this context originally.)
Another non-functioning site was "uncertainty.microsoft.com."
The purpose of that site was not known.
the change in mag-flux is small, enough to slow down ionic particles, but not enough to seriously affect a massive and low-charge probe or ship. so kinda no.
also, the heliopause and termination shock is a very small effect. its a big deal to the solar wind, but to any uncharged object bigger than a small rock its near unnoticable.
The first rule of USENET is you do not talk about USENET.
envious of Americans. We 'foriegners' give you guys A LOT of crap over wars, the environment, religion, guns etc (not that the British have a leg to stand on... we forget our history way too quickly), but the fact is that we don't have the balls to do anything like this anymore. Creating an object that can travel out of the Solar System is HUGE. It is an achievement that should stand out as a moment in history that we can be truely proud of: no-one got killed, you're not doing it for greed or wealth - its a pure scientific achievement.
Scared of flying, pointy things snce 1979!
--> What happens when you get caught browsing slashdot.
Take the cheese to sickbay, the doctor should see it as soon as possible - B'Elanna Torres, "Learning Curve"
From wikipedia : "In astronomy, the termination shock is theorised to be a boundary marking one of the outer limits of the sun's influence."
How many outer limits does the sun have and what are they ?
It is very irritating (for us geeks!) to say that humans have started space exploration. We have been raised on Star Trek and Star Wars...we can't accept having gone a few hundred kilometers up in the sky as "space". If we could take a trip to the place Voyager now is, then we can say that we have started exploring space. Until that day, we can't say anything. Here is an analogy with sea exploration: would we say that we have explored the Atlantic ocean, if the European explorers of the 15th century have just put their feet in a local lake? we wouldn't. Then how can we talk about "space age" and "space exploration"?
welfare compared to how much we spend on NASA, not too many more.
2006 budget:
Nasa: 16.5 billion
Education: 56 billion
HHS: 68.9 billion
Social Security: 540 billion
Medicare: 340 billion
Medicaid: 199 billion
Yeah, killing NASA would make a big dent.
Clear, Dark Skies
Actually, an article appeared on Slashdot a while back about this. Wiki is not peer-reviewed for accuracy. The article discussed an intentional inaccuracy posted to see how long it would be discovered. In short, it never was, and the author finally went in and changed it.
While it may be very useful in many situations, I wouldn't cite Wiki as a source. Use it to track down other sources based on its information though.
I have never let my schooling interfere with my education.
They don't really KNOW that that it crossed that TERMINATION SHOCK thingamajigger. The termination shock isn't mentioned EVEN ONCE in the bible, new OR old testament.
OMG cut NASA's funding!
Now before I get modded down, I be to remind whoever might read this that what I am saying is FACT. - bogaboga
The Nasa Near Earth Object site includes this unit in their online data since newspapers used to freak out on a regular basis when they were using only decimal AU for distance measurements. A lunar distance = about 384 kilometers and 1 au = 150 million kilometers.
Thus typical distances can be rendered in LD
Current Voyager 1 & 2 Data
With apologies for rounding errors
"It is a greater offense to steal men's labor, than their clothes"
Yes. Don't buy your tinfoil from Nationals. It actually enhances the reception for the government mind control satilites.
What's sad is that NASA is pulling the plug on Voyager, even though it only just now entered interstellar space and we know nothing about this region. For once slashdot humor is close to the reality...
There are 10 types of people in this world, those who can count in binary and those who can't.
Cassini does not have a reactor. Both Cassini and Voyager are powered by radiothermal generators (RTG's). It's a small can of plutonium that produces heat (thus power) through natural radioactive decay processes. It is not a reactor--no fission.
"We are now an interstellar species."
Not really. Thats a bit like calling an ape who chucks a stone into the sea aquatic.
I've always wondered how we get these pictures of the milky way. Anybody have a clue?
An accident at launch could have released highly toxic materal from the plutonium batteries.
While this is true, my basic problem is that most people opposed to RTGs can't understand this statement in context. The environmental impact statement of this project is particularly useful. Its in this PDF on page 19. But let's analyze that statement anyway, piece by piece.
1) An "accident" could have released material, but it was unlikely. The containers were tested under explosions, fires, shrapnel, reentry heat, and impact. The RTGs were tough enough that they could hit concrete at terminal velocity and release only a minscule amount of fuel (0.22 grams).
2) Yes, Plutonium is "highly toxic". But most people complaining about the RTGs don't worry about "toxic". They worry about "nuclear explosion" or "fallout". Of course, none of those can result from the failure of an RTG. 10kg of toxic material (only a fraction of which would actually be released in a failure) is hardly your biggest worry. I'd be more worried about the thousands of pounds of very nasty fuel in solid rocket boosters.
3) The fuel in the RTG's isn't plutonium, its plutonium dioxide. This is an important difference, because the latter is very stable, almost inert (it was believed to be completely inert until 1999), and is insoluable in water. It also has a very high melting temperature and an even higher vaporization temperature. The net result is that the mechanisms through which it can enter the environment in the event of an accident are very limited. Basically, it would have to be bulverized and become airborne. Pulverizing 10kg of a hard material encased in a strong, unrestrained container, with just a single explosion is non-trivial. The physics of the situation tend to make the container just fly away and land in the dirt.
So basically, an accident was exceedingly unlikely, and even if it did happen, release was unlikely, and even if that happend, you had bigger things to worry about at that point.
You can operate on a basis of reasonable risk management
It's not "reasonable risk management". It's "not caving in to complete paranoia".
assuming the general public is entirely ignorant of physics
The general public *is* ignorant of physics.
I'm sure there are plenty of people in the "general public" who have studied more physics and bio/chemistry than you have.)
Well that's fine and good, and I don't doubt that biology and chemistry can tell you that plutonium will cause poisoning and cancer. However, biologists and chemists are not engineers or environmental scientists. They cannot tell you the probability of an RTG failing in an explosion, nor can they tell you the environmental mechanisms through which plutonium could spread even in the case of a failure. Nor can they tell you what sort of population impact such a spread would have anyway. Finally, they are not trained to make risk assessments of this nature. Engineers build bridges (and planes and cares and buildings), that thousands of people trust their lives too every day, without a second thought, using the exact same risk assessment mechanisms the NASA folks used. If you're going to question the NASA folks, the intellectually honest thing to do would be to grill the guy who designed your car about what risks he took with your life.
I agree that people sometimes go way overboard with their resistance to anything nuclear, but that attitude was instilled in them, or their parents, pretty forcefully.
Most parents are people, and most people are stupid, therefore most parents are stupid. Is having stupid parents supposed to be an excuse for being ignorant?
And it doesn't help the situation one bit, when the only response when concerns are raised is "go away, you are ignorant"
What if "you are ignorant" is the correct answer? I do not buy the idea that it is the du
A deep unwavering belief is a sure sign you're missing something...
...how many here still haven't gotten through the termination shock of Star Trek Voyager?
I object to that article, and to the next reply.