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Voyager at Jupiter

Photography of Jupiter began in January 1979, when images of the brightly banded planet already exceeded the best taken from Earth. Voyager 1 completed its Jupiter encounter in early April, after taking almost 19,000 pictures and many other scientific measurements. Voyager 2 picked up the baton in late April and its encounter continued into August. They took more than 33,000 pictures of Jupiter and its five major satellites.

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Voyager: 15 incredible images of our solar system captured by the twin probes (gallery)

The twin probes have captured some remarkable images of our cosmic neighborhood.

NASA's twin probes Voyager 1 and Voyager 2 have captured some truly remarkable images of our solar system and are currently roaming through interstellar space. 

Despite its name Voyager 2 launched before Voyager 1 , when it lifted off from Cape Canaveral Space Launch Complex 41 aboard a Titan IIIE-Centaur on Aug. 20, 1977. Voyager 1 followed suit about two weeks later on Sept. 5. 

While Voyager 1 primarily focused on Jupiter and Saturn , Voyager 2 visited both gas giants and then ventured on to Uranus and Neptune . But the duo didn't stop there. Voyager 1 officially entered interstellar space on Aug. 25, 2012, while Voyager 2 entered on Nov. 5, 2018. The pair continue to journey through the cosmos and have enough power and fuel to keep scientific instruments running until at least 2025, according to NASA . 

Here we celebrate the achievements of both Voyager 1 and Voyager 2 with some incredible images captured by the pair. 

This image was taken when NASA's Voyager 1 spacecraft zoomed toward Jupiter in January and February 1979, capturing hundreds of images during its approach, including this close-up of swirling clouds around Jupiter's Great Red Spot . 

This image of the Earth and moon are in a single frame. Voyager was the first spacecraft to achieve this and captured the iconic image on Sept. 18, 1977, by Voyager 1 when it was 7.25 million miles from Earth. The moon is at the top of the picture and beyond the Earth as viewed by Voyager. 

Color composite by Voyager 2 showing Jupiter's faint ring system. Images captured in July 1979. 

A Voyager 1 image of Jupiter's moon Io showing the active plume of the volcano Loki. The heart-shaped feature southeast of Loki consists of fallout deposits from the active plume Pele. The images that make up this mosaic were taken from an average distance of approximately 340,000 miles (490,000 kilometers) from the moon. 

Layers of haze covering Saturn's moon Titan are seen in this image taken by Voyager 1 on Nov. 12, 1980, at a range of 13,700 miles (22,000 km). This false-color image shows the details of the haze that covers Titan. The upper level of the thick aerosol above the moon's limb appears orange. 

This view of Uranus was recorded by Voyager 2 on Jan. 25, 1986, as the spacecraft left the planet behind and set forth on the cruise to Neptune. Even at this extreme angle, Uranus retains the pale blue-green color seen by ground-based astronomers and recorded by Voyager during the historic encounter. 

This Voyager 2 high-resolution color image provides obvious evidence of vertical relief in Neptune's bright cloud streaks. These clouds were observed at a latitude of 29 degrees north near Neptune's east terminator, the "line" on a planet where daylight meets darkness. 

Global color mosaic of Triton , taken in 1989 by Voyager 2 during its flyby of the Neptune system. The color was synthesized by combining high-resolution images taken through orange, violet and ultraviolet filters; these images were displayed as red, green and blue images and combined to create this color version. 

Saturn and three of its moons, Tethys, Dione and Rhea, seen by a Voyager spacecraft on Aug. 4, 1982, from a distance of 13 million miles (21 million km). 

This narrow-angle color image of the Earth, dubbed the "Pale Blue Dot," is a part of the first ever 'portrait' of the solar system taken by Voyager 1. The spacecraft acquired a total of 60 frames for a mosaic of the solar system from a distance of more than 4 billion miles (6 billion km) from Earth and about 32 degrees above the ecliptic, which is the plane that contains most of the planets of the solar system. 

Voyager 1 took photos of Jupiter and two of its satellites (Io, left, and Europa ).

Enhanced color view of Saturn's ring system captured by Voyager 2 on Aug. 17, 1981, at a distance of 5.5 million miles (8.9 million km). The color variations between the rings possibly indicate variations in chemical composition from one part of Saturn's ring system to another.  

Close-up of the surface of Jupiter's moon Europa captured by Voyager 2 at a distance of 152,000 miles (246,000 km). 

Voyager 2 captured this image of Neptune's rings on Aug. 26, 1989, from a distance of 175,000 miles (280,000 km).  

A false-color image of Callisto captured on July 7, 1979, by Voyager 2 at a distance of about 677,000 miles (1.09 million km). Callisto is the second largest moon of Jupiter and is the most heavily cratered of the Galilean satellites. 

Daisy Dobrijevic joined Space.com in February 2022 having previously worked for our sister publication All About Space magazine as a staff writer. Before joining us, Daisy completed an editorial internship with the BBC Sky at Night Magazine and worked at the National Space Centre in Leicester, U.K., where she enjoyed communicating space science to the public. In 2021, Daisy completed a PhD in plant physiology and also holds a Master's in Environmental Science, she is currently based in Nottingham, U.K. Daisy is passionate about all things space, with a penchant for solar activity and space weather. She has a strong interest in astrotourism and loves nothing more than a good northern lights chase! 

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Voyager 2 Color Image of Enceladus, Almost Full Disk

This color Voyager 2 image mosaic shows the water-ice-covered surface of Enceladus, one of Saturn's icy moons. Enceladus' diameter of just 500 km would fit across the state of Arizona, yet despite its small size Enceladus exhibits one of the most interesting surfaces of all the icy satellites. Enceladus reflects about 90% of the incident sunlight (about like fresh-fallen snow), placing it among the most reflective objects in the Solar System. Several geologic terrains have superposed crater densities that span a factor of at least 500, thereby indicating huge differences in the ages of these terrains. It is possible that the high reflectivity of Enceladus' surface results from continuous deposition of icy particles from Saturn's E-ring, which in fact may originate from icy volcanoes on Enceladus' surface. Some terrains are dominated by sinuous mountain ridges from 1 to 2 km high (3300 to 6600 feet), whereas other terrains are scarred by linear cracks, some of which show evidence for possible sideways fault motion such as that of California's infamous San Andreas fault. Some terrains appear to have formed by separation of icy plates along cracks, and other terrains are exceedingly smooth at the resolution of this image. The implication carried by Enceladus' surface is that this tiny ice ball has been geologically active and perhaps partially liquid in its interior for much of its history. The heat engine that powers geologic activity here is thought to be elastic deformation caused by tides induced by Enceladus' orbital motion around Saturn and the motion of another moon, Dione.

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Voyager 2 image of uranus.

This is an image of the planet Uranus taken by the spacecraft Voyager 2. NASA’s Voyager 2 spacecraft flew closely past distant Uranus, the seventh planet from the Sun, in January 1986.

Image Credit: NASA/JPL

Space photo of the week: 1st-ever close-up of Neptune is Voyager 2's final portrait of a planet

Voyager 2, NASA's longest-running mission, explored Neptune during a historic encounter on Aug. 25, 1989, sending back humanity's first close-ups of the planet.

What it is: One of the final photographs of Neptune taken by NASA 's Voyager 2 probe

Where it is: 2.8 billion miles (4.5 billion kilometers) from the sun

When it was taken: Aug. 25, 1989

When it was shared: Aug. 19, 2024

Why it's so special: Only one spacecraft has ever visited the eighth and most distant planet from the sun.

On Aug. 25, 1989, NASA's Voyager 2 spacecraft took the first-ever close-up images of Neptune. This one — among the last full-disk photos taken before the probe ended its "Grand Tour" of the planets — became one of the most iconic. It revealed Neptune as a deep azure blue, which colored the public's perception of the planet for decades. (That is, until a new treatment of Voyager 2's images earlier this year revealed Neptune's true color to be a much lighter blue green.)

Voyager 2's original images were taken in false color using filters — a standard technique used by planetary astronomers. In this case, blue and green filters were used alongside one that passes light at a wavelength absorbed by methane gas. According to scientists , hydrogen and helium dominate Neptune's atmosphere, but methane gives it its blue appearance by absorbing red light. The filters make methane look dark blue in this image, but they also reveal a semitransparent haze layer across the planet. The bright-red edge around Neptune is caused by the haze scattering sunlight at higher altitudes, above most of the methane.

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Voyager 2 took this shot almost precisely 12 years after it launched on a Titan-Centaur rocket from Cape Canaveral, Florida. Having visited Jupiter in 1979, Saturn in 1981 and Uranus in 1985, Voyager's closest approach to Neptune came on Aug. 25, 1989. During the flyby, Voyager also visited two of Neptune's moons, Triton and Nereid, and discovered six new moons and four rings .

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Because Neptune is about 30 times farther from the sun than Earth is, it gets only a faction of a percent of Earth's sunlight, meaning Voyager 2 had to take long-exposure images. So engineers fired the fast-moving spacecraft's thrusters to have it rotate so the camera could remain focused.

Voyager 2's images from Neptune were its last, sent back as radio signals with 13-watt transmitters — about enough power to run a refrigerator light bulb, according to NASA — and took four hours to travel across the solar system to NASA's Deep Space Network of radio antennae across the world.

Neptune was Voyager 2's last stop before it traveled to the solar system's edge. The probe entered interstellar space on Nov. 5, 2018. Voyager 2 remains NASA's longest-running mission, even after encountering some communication problems last summer.

For more groovy space photos, check out our space photo of the week archives . New stories post every Sunday.

Jamie Carter is a freelance journalist and regular Live Science contributor based in Cardiff, U.K. He is the author of A Stargazing Program For Beginners and lectures on astronomy and the natural world. Jamie regularly writes for Space.com, TechRadar.com, Forbes Science, BBC Wildlife magazine and Scientific American, and many others. He edits WhenIsTheNextEclipse.com .

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Daily Visual 20.08.15: Voyager 2 and the Golden Record

On this day in 1977, the Voyager 2 space probe was launched by NASA. It was developed as part of the Voyager program, which saw two identical probes sent to study the outer Solar System and eventually interstellar space.

The unmanned crafts – each weighing 721.9 kg at launch, with a power of 420 watts, and communicating by means of a 3.7-metre parabolic high-gain antenna – were launched from Cape Canaveral, Florida. After Voyager 2’s ascent on 20 August, Voyager 1 was launched a couple of weeks later, on 5 September.

The probes were initially sent on what was conceived as a ‘Planetary Grand Tour’, to cover the giant outer planets of Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus, and Neptune. These planets were due to align at the end of the 1970s, an event which would not recur for another 175 years.

Though Voyager 2 was launched first, Voyager 1 was sent at a different trajectory and sooner reached Jupiter and Saturn. Voyager 1 passed through the Jovian system in 1979, and the Saturnian system in 1980 – thus completing its primary mission, after which it embarked for Titan, Saturn’s largest moon.

Voyager 2’s primary mission came to a conclusion at the close of 1989, after it had encountered the Jovian system in 1979, the Saturnian system in 1981, the Uranian system in 1986, and the Neptunian system in 1989. Voyager 2 remains the only space craft to have visited the outer planets of Uranus and Neptune.

After opting, on the basis of scientific value and calculated risk, to send Voyager 1 by Titan rather than towards Pluto, beyond 1989 Voyager 2’s trajectory could not be altered to make it pass what was still then considered the ninth planet from the sun. Pluto therefore remained unexplored until the New Horizons spacecraft passed by it and its five moons, on 14 July 2015.

Voyager 2 has now been in operation for precisely 38 years. The Deep Space Network continues to receive its data transmissions. Along with Voyager 1, it is expected to keep sending weak radio messages until at least 2025.

At a distance of 108 AU (1.62×10 10  km) from the Sun, and moving at a velocity of 15.4 km/s, Voyager 2 is one of the most distant man-made objects from Earth: accompanied by Voyager 1, and by Pioneer 10 and Pioneer 11, which embarked in 1972 and 1973 on earlier missions to the asteroid belt, Jupiter, and Saturn. Voyager 1 is currently the farthest man-made object from Earth, becoming on 25 August 2012 the first to enter interstellar space.

Both Voyager space probes carry aboard the Voyager Golden Record. The contents of this phonograph record were selected for NASA by a committee chaired by the prominent astronomer and astrophysicist Carl Sagan.

Together Sagan and committee members selected 115 images (although they were forbidden, after controversy over the Pioneer plaques, to send any nudity); an array of natural sounds, from volcanoes to wild dogs to the brainwaves of Sagan’s partner Ann Druyan; a medley of varied musical compositions; greetings in 55 languages both modern and ancient; and printed messages from then-US President Jimmy Carter and UN Secretary-General Kurt Waldheim. Carter’s message states:

‘This is a present from a small, distant world, a token of our sounds, our science, our images, our music, our thoughts and our feelings. We are attempting to survive our time so we may live into yours. We hope someday, having solved the problems we face, to join a community of galactic civilizations. This record represents our hope and our determination, and our good will in a vast and awesome universe.’

Each Golden Record is encased in a protective aluminum jacket, together with a cartridge and needle. Symbolic instructions indicate how the enclosed record should be played. But if the size of the probes and the chances of reaching a suitable audience are small, still the Golden Record is as much a celebration of the diversity of life on Earth.

The selection of music on the Golden Record plays for ninety minutes. The pieces included are as follows:

Carl Sagan had originally requested permission to include ‘Here Comes the Sun’, from the Beatles’ 1969 album Abbey Road . However EMI had concerns over copyright, and denied the request.

The great field recorder and musicologist Alan Lomax  was one of Sagan’s main consultants when it came to choosing the music on the Golden Record. Aside from the blues, jazz, and rock music of Blind Willie Johnson, Louis Armstrong, and Chuck Berry, Lomax was responsible for much of the record’s scope: forwarding among other things Peruvian panpipes; a polyphonic Pygmy girls’ initiation song from Zaire; an Azerbaijani mugham performed by Kamil Jalilov; and a Bulgarian folk song, with traditional bagpipes, sung by Valya Balkanska. Sagan wrote that Lomax:

‘was a persistent and vigorous advocate for including ethnic music even at the expense of Western classical music. He brought pieces so compelling and beautiful that we gave in to his suggestions more often than I would have thought possible. There was, for example, no room for Debussy among our selections, because Azerbaijanis play bagpipe-sounding instruments and Peruvians play panpipes and such exquisite pieces had been recorded by ethnomusicologists known to Lomax.’

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Voyager at Uranus

At its closet, the spacecraft came within 81,800 kilometers (50,600 miles) of Uranus's cloudtops on Jan. 24, 1986. Voyager 2 radioed thousands of images and voluminous amounts of other scientific data on the planet, its moons, rings, atmosphere, interior and the magnetic environment surrounding Uranus.

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Voyager 2 False-Color Image of Saturn's Rings (IMAGE)

Lomonosov Moscow State University

This is a Voyager 2 false-color image of Saturn's rings. Subtle color variations due to differences in surface composition of the particles making up the rings are enhanced in this image produced by combining ultraviolet, clear, and orange frames.

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Celebrating 40 Years since Chakrulo Went to Space

Exactly 40 years ago, back in Soviet Georgia, a truly historic thing happened: ‘Chakrulo,’ one of the rare pearls of Georgian polyphony, was sent into space on Voyager 2, on a gold disc together with 26 other masterpieces from all over of the world. In 2016, ‘Voyager 1’ was the first rocket to leave the solar system in the footsteps of Voyager 2.

On September 5, Mankind celebrated the 40th anniversary since Voyager shot into space with those 27 songs. On September 25-28, legendary Rob Manning, Chief Engineer of the Mars Program of NASA, and John Casani, Voyager former Project Manager, will come to Georgia.

Chakrulo, a Kartl-Kakhetian classical polyphonic choir song, was recognized by UNESCO as a Masterpiece of Non-Material Heritage and Folklore of Mankind.

Ramaz Bluashvili, director, producer and researcher, Founder and President of the Foundation for Promoting Science and Education ‘Nova,’ has studied in the US and worked with the ‘Erisioni’ Singing and Dancing State Ensemble. He first heard the incredible story of Chakrulo in his childhood. However, due to the lack of access to information (no google!), children knew very little about it. That is why he established the foundation to get young children interested in science. “If we inspire them in the right way, maybe another Einstein will be born,” he tells GEORGIA TODAY. “When I went to study in the US, I stumbled upon the name Alexander Kartveli, a prominent Georgian-American aircraft designer. I spent the next 2.5 years researching his life. I went to every archive in the States: NASA, the Pentagon, museums, etc. People thought Kartveli was Russian and, since he didn’t have any children, no one remembered him. While researching his life at NASA, I had a chance to ask about Chakrulo. They gave me the contact of Ann Druyan, widow of the legendary Carl Sagan. I emailed her as a Georgian. I still have a copy of the email. She replied that she was happy to hear from me and told me the incredible story of how the decision was made to send a message from Mankind. They needed several pieces of music from all over the world. Chakrulo was one of the chosen ones,” Bluashvili says.

Three days after the decision was made, NASA got a call from Moscow pointing to the fact that Georgia was not an independent country, but a part of the Soviet Union. They even nominated a famous Russian song, ‘Moscow Nights,’ instead of Chakrulo. Reportedly, ‘Moscow Nights’ was a nice song, but was not the masterpiece the NASA team were looking for. Official Moscow even translated Chakrulo’s words into English. It belongs to the Medieval Ages, when Georgian was at war. They tried to push the idea that it did not make sense to send such an aggressive song as part of a peace-project. “But Carl Sagan was not that easy to manipulate,” Bluashvili explains. “Despite Moscow’s push, the decision was made and Chakrulo ended up going into space”.

The story was so impressive that he decided to make a film about it. “It wasn’t easy. But I was lucky enough to get to meet literally everyone from the management team of Voyager 2 who was still alive,” Bluashvili continues. “I will never forget arriving in Los Angeles and the next day getting an invite to Rob Manning’s house with my cameraman. They put me in touch with Voyager’s Scientific Director, Ed Stone, John Casani, former project manager, and Susan Dodd, current Voyager project manager. Now, we’re all great friends. After I met them, I had the even more ambitious idea to celebrate Voyager’s 40th anniversary in Georgia. Casani and Manning agreed to come. So, I’m glad to say that on September 25-28, there will be a lot of meetings with schools and children and interactive lectures. Manning also agreed to give an open lecture for children at the Opera House. The main event will be on September 28, when the Georgian State Singing and Dancing ensemble ‘Erisioni’, the same ensemble which is on the gold disc sent into space, will perform at a concert dedicated to the anniversary. At the end of the show, Rostom Saginashvili, who is 70 years old and whose voice is in space, is going to meet 80-year-old John Casani. It will be one of the most important events to promote Georgia, because this event, the 40th anniversary, is a worldwide event right now. I can name media outlets such as CNN, BBC, The Guardian, The New York Times, all talking about it. I already read around 50 articles about it. The fact that Georgia is a part of such a global event first of all makes me proud and should make everyone proud. We have 27 musical examples on Voyager 2 and one of them is Georgian. It’s not an American project, but one of all Mankind. We have to tell everyone that we Georgians contributed to the only message sent from Mankind to outer space”.

Gia Baghashvili, well-known Georgian pianist and folklorist, told GEORGIA TODAY about the importance of Chakrulo from the musicological perspective: “Chakrulo is not only a masterpiece of Georgian polyphonic singing and a symbol of national unity for Georgians, it’s part of the tangible heritage of humanity. The reason Chakrulo was selected and put on the disc can be described through the words of Rostropovich, a genius musician and open-minded person who said that the Georgian song allows you to ‘get a taste of eternity’. Listening to Chakrulo, you feel the dignity of the song. It has a perfectly consistent harmony and incredible musical dramaturgy which changes the concept of singing forms of folk music. The incredible power of Chakrulo has something in the deep roots of the past and yet it is very modern. While children continue to sing Chakrulo, this will also be part of the future. It has the simultaneous existence of past, present and future, which I believe gives it that taste of eternity. I’m very thankful to Ramaz, not only for giving me the chance to say some words about Chakrulo, but also for the idea to celebrate it in Tbilisi”.

Maka Lomadze

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