Okay, I have been so excited to post this news for a long time now. I have been following this story closely for over a year, as it came closer and closer to being official. After months of speculation and poring over the data, chief scientists confirmed today via Science that Voyager I has offically entered intersteller space!


http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-24026153
News article in case you can't open up the journal.

There has been some speculation and debate ongoing over the exact timing this would take place, but the consensus is that the information verifies Voyager I has entered the new frontier (as of August 2012). This may not seem like breaking news to some folks, but I couldn't be more excited, and wish to offer congratulations to NASA and the entire Voyager team and everyone behind the scenes that made this possible. It is a pretty momentus feat.

36 years and 19 billion kms later, and still going. What an amazing accomplishment for a spacecraft built at the dawn of the technological age! Now I might not have been around when the Voyager program was setting out, but it has always truly fascinated me. Such marvels and feats of discovery about something we really know so little about.

Space remains such an unknown, and for this little piece of human engineering to have crossed out of our solar system is really spectacular. If you stop and think for a minute about it - the distances travelled, the frontiers crossed, and the information this little probe is providing - it is really awe inspiring. It really kinda makes you think about the bigger picture of civilisation and puts our petty squabbles into perspective. I am not sure if at some time in history we will ever repeat that drive and collaboration to explore like it was during the era of the space race, but I really do hope we can return to it some day.

As a scientist, as an engineer, a humbled person, and just a massive all-around sci-fi nerd with an explorer's heart, this really makes me so happy. Keep on truckin' V-Ger.

I know! I just posted about this on FB! We can quibble on a few facts (if you include comets in the solar system, it may take another what, 30,000 years?, before it officially is out of the heliosphere... But hey! Momentous.

I can't shake a Forge of God / Anvil of Stars dread, though...

PS: Didn't know you were an engineer S! Way to go! That's what I was lining up to be... Before I dropped out!

Fuck all this nerd talk. More discussion about Japanese toys

This is exciting news indeed. Of course I'll probably be long dead before any information ever gets relayed back, but this will be good for the Great (x 1,000) grandkids

Say whaaaat? Nerds forever, baby. And technically the signal only takes 17 hours to reach the Earth (radiowaves). But yeah, it will be a long while before it encounters another celestial object.
[going through and making sense of all of the information on the other hand....]

Yep. I am technically a member of the iron ring club (but don't tell anyone!). Still hasn't helped me find any work, so luckily I have a hobby of bioengineering kaiju creations in my home laboratory.

Telling people might help you get a job...

And who knows, within a few generations we might all be downloaded into machines, so eternal life and interstellar travel, here we come!

I remember talk of this in the 70's when I was a wee kid. It's really a shame we waste so much time on this planet towards frivolous non mankind benefitting events like war etc when we could collectively be exploring space more. NASA's budget has been declining for decades yet the defense budget always seems to increase. I mean todays technology is so much more advanced then it was in the 70's, imagine what we could be sending up? New Horizons is heading out that way at least and that was launched in 2006.

Super exciting stuff! Sometimes I feel like the times we're living in are really cool, because we're witnessing science fiction becoming reality. But at other times I feel like I'm going to miss out on the REALLY cool stuff - I'd love to be around when we start receiving images from other solar systems! Or be able to travel off-world (that's probably my biggest wish)!
I do agree that we should be focusing our resources towards beneficial goals such as space exploration. But at least we have a few wealthy individuals and pioneering organizations who are picking up where our governments have failed us. Elon Musk and Mars-One are two examples that I'm watching with great interest. But surely we could be putting von Neumann probes into space right now if we put our resources into that rather than into Halliburton and Goldman Sachs.