On November 18, 2026, NASA's Voyager 1 probe will become the first human-made object to be one light-day away from Earth. That is 25.9 billion kilometers. A radio signal will take a full day to travel there, and the reply will take another day. Just before the record, communication with the probe was lost for two days but then restored. This was reported by Qazaqyia.kz citing Kursiv Media.
A light-day is the distance light travels in 24 hours. Radio signals travel at the same speed. Light takes about 8 minutes to travel from Earth to the Sun, but a full day to reach Voyager 1. According to NASA's calculations, the probe will be 25.902 billion kilometers away on November 18, 2026.
Commands to the probe will have to be sent a day before they reach it. The reply will come back another day later, meaning a simple exchange of messages will take about 48 hours. This milestone will not affect the spacecraft's operation or the conditions around it. But it shows how far humanity's most distant creation has gone: the probe was launched in September 1977, and it is now flying at about 61,000 kilometers per hour.
On October 18 and 19, NASA's Deep Space Network antennas could not pick up Voyager 1's signal. Communication was restored on October 20, after about 48 hours. Since then, specialists have maintained contact with the probe.
Engineers found that during the failure one of the orientation thruster groups switched off. The onboard computer automatically turned on a backup group: the probe is programmed to react this way. The spacecraft entered safe mode and suspended routine operations. The signal returned even before specialists on Earth sent commands for a check.
"This is the first time we've seen this kind of behavior from a spacecraft, but the mission is now at a stage where we need to be prepared for surprises," said Kareem Badaruddin, Voyager project manager at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory.
Voyager 1 and its twin Voyager 2 get electricity from generators that convert heat from plutonium decay into current. Power drops by about four watts each year. To keep the probes running, engineers are gradually turning off instruments that are no longer needed.
Astronomers reported that from November 13 to 22, 2026, before sunrise, a parade of four planets — Mercury, Venus, Mars and Jupiter — will be visible. All are bright enough to observe with the naked eye.