Voyager.

[cee-dee]

Isn't it astonishing that 41 years ago the two Voyager spacecraft were launched and they're still speeding out of our Solar ststem?

Voyager 1 is 13,500 MILLION miles from Earth now and Voyager 2 is lagging behind a bit being "only" 11,177 MILLION miles from Earth.

It's also amazing that such "ancient" technology is still able to communicate (albeit slowly) from such a distance?

You can just keep track of the distances here:-  https://voyager.jpl.nasa.gov/

[suzieseaside]

Yes, amazing!
Have you seen any of The Planets series with Brian Cox?
Fascinating 👍

[cee-dee]

Although BC is a revered physicist I don't care for his delivery, the way he speaks/narates.

I like the Discovery series, "How the Universe works".

One  of the things that amazes me about the Voyager craft is that they've not hit anything (or anything's hit them). The solar system and beyond is "full" of all sorts of bits of stuff and it'd only take a tiny speck of stuff to destroy the craft?

They say both spacecraft have now entered interstellar space but do we really know how far "out" our solar system and it's collection of space remnants extends? So far, there's been no sign of Nemesis but who knows if it's out there or not?

[mustard-tree]

13,500 MILLION miles from Earth sounds a very long way, but only  a fraction of one light year.

Are there no conspiricy stories that it never happened.

How much has our technology grown since then.

[cee-dee]

It's grown by leaps and bounds since the Voyagers were launched but we still can't travel fast enough to make space travel a reality. Although the Voyagers are travelling fast by Earth standards, in space it's a crawl. Even the speed of light is too slow so unless they discover some new method for generating power (Á la Star Trek?) we're not going to go very far in space.

[cee-dee]

They say the Voyagers have left the Solar system but..... we don't know where our Solar system "ends". We're used to clearly defined boundaries but where the Solar system and space is concerned, the boundaries (that is if a boundary exists at all) are not clear.

Nearing the "boundary" of our Solar system objects are so small as to appear almost microscopic when considering the distances involved. Any objects there are emitting no light so we can't see anything out there.

Some think that "out there" is Nemesis, a companion star to the sun. They say that if it really is "out there", it's a star that didn't "light up", it's a Brown Dwarf. We just don't know but they think that way because "something" has somehow caused some cosmic disturbance which has caused mass extinctions around every 26 - 27 million years.

There's a lot to learn about our close cosmic neighbourhood never mind far distant space?

[cee-dee]

OK, I know I'm resurrecting an old thread of mine but I think I made a mistake in my OP!!! 🤔 Voyager 2 is 12.3 BILLION miles away now (not millions of miles away). Voyager 1 is around 15 BILLION miles away. As space distances go, in 46 years Voyager 2' s not got very far? It just shows you that for space travel we've got a very long way to go before space travel will be practical, that is, if it ever does? Some things we saw in Star Trek have become a reality but we've a very long way to go before Warp Speed becomes reality too?

Voyager's travelling at around 34,400 MPH which is a bit slow by space travel standards (it's a wonder it's not hit something?) and now NASA has lost contact with Voyager 2 due to "sending the wrong command". A bit careless?:-

Voyager 2: Nasa loses contact with record-breaking probe after sending wrong command - BBC News