It is almost half a century since Voyager 1 was launched from Cape Canaveral in Florida on a mission to study Jupiter, Saturn, and the atmosphere of Titan. It continues to send data back to Earth.

Although engineers reckon that the aging spacecraft might survive well into the 2030s before eventually passing out of range of the Deep Space Network, the spacecraft's cosmic ray subsystem was switched off in 2025 . More of the probe's instruments are earmarked for termination as engineers eke out Voyager's power supply for a few more years.

On September 5, 1977, the power situation was a good deal healthier when the mission got underway. Launched just over two weeks after Voyager 2, Voyager 1 was scheduled to make flybys of Jupiter and Saturn. It skipped a visit to Pluto in favor of a closer

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