The Voyager program is a space exploration program of the United States’ NASA agency. It consists of a pair of unmanned scientific probes, Voyager 1 and Voyager 2. They were launched in 1977 to take advantage of a rare alignment among the outer four planets (Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus and Neptune) in the late 1970s, and which would not take place for another 175 years. Although they were officially used to study just Jupiter and Saturn, the two probes were able to continue their mission into the outer solar system. They have since continued out and exited the solar system. These probes were built at JPL and were funded by NASA.
Both missions have gathered large amounts of data about the gas giants of the solar system, of which little was known before. In addition, the spacecraft paths have been used to place limits on the existence of Planet X, a planet believed by some people to be farther from the Sun than Pluto.
(Credit: https://kids.kiddle.co/Voyager_program)
The twin Voyager 1 and 2 spacecraft are exploring where nothing from Earth has flown before. Continuing on their more-than-40-year journey since their 1977 launches, they each are much farther away from Earth and the sun than Pluto. In August 2012, Voyager 1 made the historic entry into interstellar space, the region between stars, filled with material ejected by the death of nearby stars millions of years ago. Voyager 2 entered interstellar space on November 5, 2018 and scientists hope to learn more about this region. Both spacecraft are now in travelling in the interstellar space and still sending scientific information about their surroundings through the Deep Space Network, or DSN.
The primary mission was the exploration of Jupiter and Saturn. After making a string of discoveries there — such as active volcanoes on Jupiter’s moon Io and intricacies of Saturn’s rings — the mission was extended. Voyager 2 went on to explore Uranus and Neptune, and is still the only spacecraft to have visited those outer planets. The adventurers’ current mission, the Voyager Interstellar Mission (VIM), will explore the outermost edge of the Sun’s domain, and beyond. (Credit: https://voyager.jpl.nasa.gov/mission/)
