The Voyager probes
The Voyager probes are two robotic spacecraft launched by NASA in 1977 to explore the outer planets of our solar system. Voyager 1 and Voyager 2 flew by Jupiter, Saturn, and beyond, using gravity-assist techniques to gain speed. They matter enormously because they are humanity's most distant messengers: both have now entered interstellar space, traveling beyond the sun's influence. Voyager 1 is currently the farthest human-made object from Earth. Despite their original decade-long mission, both probes continue operating and sending data back home, making them humanity's greatest long-range explorers.
Sources
- en.wikipedia.org: “The Voyager program is an American scientific program that employs two interstellar probes, Voyager 1 and Voyager 2. They were launched in 1977 to take advantage of a favorable planetary alignment to explore the two gas giants Jupiter and Saturn”
- en.wikipedia.org: “The two Voyagers are the only human-made objects to date that have passed into interstellar space — a record they will hold until at least the 2040s — and Voyager 1 is the farthest human-made object from Earth.”
- en.wikipedia.org: “As of 2026, both Voyagers are still in operation beyond the outer boundary of the heliosphere in interstellar space.”