Happy Anniversary Voyager 1

Thirty years ago today, the Voyager 1 spacecraft rocketed into the sky to join its sister craft, Voyager 2, on a mission to boldly go where no Earth-based creations had gone before.

The probes were originally meant to visit just Jupiter and Saturn, but NASA scientists decided to extend the mission to include other planets after receiving stunning images and other data from the two gas giants.

Today both Voyager probes are still going strong and are speeding toward the outer reaches of the solar system to explore what lies beyond our sun's sphere of influence. Now about 10 billion miles (16 billion kilometers) from the sun, Voyager 1 is farther from Earth than any other humanmade object. (Above information and photo is from National Geographic. Be sure to visit their site to see other things that Voyager has found during its travels).

2 years, 3 months, and 2 days later, Star Trek: the Motion Picture was released. In this movie, a huge cloud is heading towards Earth and everything that gets in its way is drained of all power and then vanishes...Kirk, Spock, McCoy and crew head off on a newly refitted Enterprise with a young crew to face this threat. In the end what is discovered is that at the center of the crowd is Voyager 1.

Voyager 1 had been damaged during its exploration of the universe. The machine civilization discovered it and repaired it as best as they could to continue with its mission which was to gather information and share with its creator. Along its journey, Voyager gained intelligence and when it returned to the solar system it had orginated from, it could not beleive that the 'carbon-based' units on Earth were its creator. Instead, they were seen as an infestation that had to be terminated. In the end a new life form was created and the first of many Star Trek movies was ended (and James T. Kirk had saved us once again!).

It is an interesting idea to contemplate though. What exactly will Voyager 1 and Voyager 2 run into on their travels?

I wish both Voyagers good travels! Live Long and Prosper! And bring back exciting information!