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Voyager 1 isn’t done yet — not even close 
NASA just pulled off another miracle save:
The spacecraft’s primary roll thrusters, offline since 2004, were believed permanently dead
With backup thrusters at risk of failure, JPL engineers gambled on a high-stakes heater reset
If wrong, it could’ve caused a small onboard explosion If right, it would restore control — 15.6 billion miles from Earth
They were right. The thrusters fired. Voyager 1 can still hold its course.
This wasn’t a reboot. It was old-school problem-solving, deep systems knowledge, and the audacity to trust an idea that might just work.
The most distant human object is still flying — because a team believed it could.
#Voyager1 #NASA #Space #Engineering #Resilience #DeepSpace
https://www.theregister.com/2025/05/15/voyager_1_survives_with_thruster_fix/
@brian_greenberg this is how software should be build.
♬ 
@peterrenshaw@ioc.exchangeIn 2024 the techniques used to fix hardware failure: “a critical breakthrough in March offered a glimmer of hope. By transmitting a carefully crafted “poke” command, engineers were able to elicit a response from Voyager 1 in the form of a memory readout. This readout acts as a digital snapshot of the FDS’s internal state, potentially holding the key to diagnosing the problem. By meticulously comparing it to an earlier readout from before the malfunction, engineers hope to pinpoint the exact nature of the glitch.
Early signs suggest a corrupted memory unit might be the culprit. This would explain the garbled data transmissions received since November.
Joseph Westlake, director of NASA’s heliophysics division, believes a software workaround could be the answer. The plan involves a delicate maneuver – shifting a few hundred “words” (each word being two bytes) of software within the flight computer’s memory. This intricate operation, akin to brain surgery on a machine millions of miles away, would effectively bypass the corrupted memory section.”
<https://nasaspacenews.com/2024/03/nasas-promising-path-to-overcoming-voyager-1-computer-hurdles/>