Voyager 1 Reaches Interstellar Space Thursday Sep 12,2013

NASA's Voyager 1 spacecraft officially is the first human-made object to venture into interstellar space
On September 12, 2013, NASA announced that Voyager 1 had crossed the heliopause and entered  interstellar space on August 25, 2012, making it the first manmade object to do so

Voyager 1 has crossed a new frontier, becoming the first spacecraft ever to leave the solar system, NASA said Thursday Sep 12,2013. Thirty-six years after it was launched from Earth on a tour of the outer planets, the plutonium-powered probe is more than 11 1/2 billion miles (18.51 billion kilometers) from the sun, cruising through interstellar space _ the vast, cold emptiness between the stars

Voyager 1's odyssey began in 1977 when the spacecraft and its twin, Voyager 2, were launched on a tour of the gas giant planets of the solar system. After beaming back dazzling postcard views of Jupiter's giant red spot and Saturn's shimmering rings, Voyager 2 hopscotched to Uranus and Neptune. Meanwhile, Voyager 1 used Saturn as a gravitational slingshot to power itself past Pluto.
Voyager 1, which is about the size of a subcompact car, carries instruments that study magnetic fields, cosmic rays and solar wind.

Voyager 1 and its twin, Voyager 2, were launched 16 days apart in 1977. Both spacecraft flew by Jupiter and Saturn. Voyager 2 also flew by Uranus and Neptune. Voyager 2, launched before Voyager 1, is the longest continuously operated spacecraft. It is about 9.5 billion miles (15 billion kilometers) away from our sun. 

 It may take another three years before Voyager 2 joins its twin on the other side. Eventually, the Voyagers will run out of nuclear fuel and will have to power down their instruments, perhaps by 2025


About Voyager 1

• Voyager 1 is a 722-kilogram (1,590 lb) Space Probe launched by NASA on September 5, 1977 to study the outersolar System

• At a distance of about 125 Astronomical Unit from the Sun as of August 2013, it is the farthest man-made object from Earth

• The primary mission ended on November 20, 1980, after encounters with theJovian System in 1979 and the Saturnian System in 1980. It was the first probe to provide detailed images of the two planets and their moons