Most distant human-made object from earth
As of December 7, 2007, Voyager 1 was at a distance of 104.7 AU (approximately 15.671 terameters, 9.74 billion miles or 0.0016 light years) from the Sun, which makes it the most distant human-made object from Earth.
At this distance, it is more distant from the Sun than any known natural solar system object, including 90377 Sedna. Though Sedna has an orbit that takes it 975 AU away from the Sun at aphelion, as of 2006 it is less than 90 AU away from the Sun and approaching its perihelion at 76 AU.
Current location and trajectories of Pioneer and Voyager spacecraft
Current location and trajectories of Pioneer and Voyager spacecraft
At its current distance, light (which travels at 186,282.397 miles per second or 299,792.458 kilometers per second) takes over 13.8 hours to reach the spacecraft from Earth. As a basis for comparison, the Moon is about 1.4 light-seconds from Earth, the Sun is approximately 8.5 light-minutes away, Pluto, about 5.5 light-hours, and the nearest star is 4.2 light-years away. As of November 2005, the spacecraft was traveling at a speed of 17.2 kilometers per second relative to the sun (3.6 AU per year or 38,400 miles per hour), 10% faster than Voyager 2. Accurate information concerning its location can be found in this NASA paper with heliocentric coordinates extrapolated up to 2015 of both probes.
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yager 1 is not heading towards any particular star, but in 40,000 years it will be within 1.6 light years of the star AC+79 3888 in the Ophiuchus constellation.
On March 31, 2006, the amateur radio operators from AMSAT Germany tracked and received data from Voyager 1 using the 20-metre (66 ft) dish at Bochum with a long integration technique. Its data were checked and verified against data from the Deep Space Network station at Madrid, Spain. This is believed to be the first such tracking of Voyager.
Voyager 1, as of September 2006, is at 12.22° declination and 17.051 hours right ascension, placing it in the constellation Ophiuchus. NASA continues daily tracking of the spacecraft with the Deep Space Network stations.
