Voyager 1: Humanity’s Message Beyond the Solar System

“Hyeongseop, that’s Voyager 1. It launched from Earth in 1977, and right now, it’s completely left the solar system, flying through much deeper space.”

“It left the solar system? Is that even possible?”

“Yes, in 2012 Voyager 1 crossed the boundary where the Sun’s influence ends, entering the space between stars. It’s the farthest thing humanity has ever made.”

Hyeongseop found it amazing that this tiny point was still drifting even farther away this very moment.

“So why did Voyager 1 travel so far in the first place?”

“It was originally sent to closely study Jupiter and Saturn. But after finishing that mission, it was simply left to keep flying in the same direction. Now, with no particular destination, it just keeps heading onward into deep space.”

“So what’s actually inside Voyager 1?”

“It carries a special golden record. It’s called the ‘Golden Record’, and it holds sounds and music from Earth, greetings in many languages, and photographs. If, someday far in the future, some other intelligent life discovers it, it’s meant to let them know beings like us once lived on Earth.”

“Whoa, so it’s like a letter we sent out into space?”

“Exactly. It wasn’t sent expecting a reply, but with the hope that someone, someday, might read it.”

“Is Voyager 1 going to keep flying forever?”

“Well, someday its fuel will run out and it won’t have the power to send signals anymore. But even after that, it’ll keep drifting through space. Maybe even tens of thousands, or hundreds of millions of years from now, that Golden Record will still be out there traveling somewhere in the universe.”

“Can we still talk to it right now?”

“We can still exchange very faint signals with it. But it takes an incredibly long time for a signal to travel that far. If you send a message to Voyager 1 right now, it takes over twenty-two hours just to arrive. And then the reply takes just as long to come back.”

“Whoa, so you’d have to wait almost a whole day just to hear one answer.”

Hyeongseop thought about how that tiny point of light had drifted so far that even a signal could barely reach it anymore, and quietly hoped that the greeting from Earth tucked inside it would someday reach someone, somewhere.