NASA Deactivates Voyager 1 LECP for Power Savings

NASA engineers deactivated the Low-Energy Charged Particles experiment on Voyager 1 on April 17, marking another step to conserve the spacecraft's dwindling power supply as it explores interstellar space more than 15 billion miles from Earth.

The decision followed an unexpected drop in power levels during a routine roll maneuver on February 27. Voyager 1 relies on a radioisotope thermoelectric generator, which converts heat from decaying plutonium into electricity and loses about four watts annually. The sudden decline brought the probe perilously close to triggering its automatic fault-protection system, which would have shut down components independently and complicated recovery efforts from such a vast distance. Commands to deactivate the instrument took roughly 23 hours to reach the spacecraft, with the shutdown process completing in about three hours and 15 minutes.

The Low-Energy Charged Particles, or LECP, instrument had operated almost continuously since Voyager 1's launch in 1977, measuring ions, electrons, and cosmic rays from the solar system and beyond. It provided key data on the structure of the interstellar medium, including pressure fronts and variations in...