Voyager 1 Reestablishes Contact Using Decades-Old Transmitter

NASA engineers have restored communication with Voyager 1 by activating a transmitter last used in 1981 after a fault protection system triggered a shutdown.

Voyager 1, launched in 1977, is the farthest human-made object from Earth, currently over 15 billion miles away in interstellar space.
The spacecraft's primary X-band transmitter was shut down by its fault protection system after a command to activate a heater, leading to a communication blackout.
NASA engineers used the S-band transmitter, which had not been used since 1981, to reestablish contact, despite its weaker signal.
The fault protection system's activation and subsequent transmitter switch are under investigation to prevent future communication issues.
Voyager 1 continues to provide valuable data from interstellar space, but its aging systems present ongoing challenges for NASA's engineering team.