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The Voyager Missions Facts & Worksheets

Through the Voyager mission, twin Voyager 1 and 2 spacecraft are exploring where nothing from Earth has flown before.

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Through the Voyager mission, twin Voyager 1 and 2 spacecraft are exploring where nothing from Earth has flown before. Continuing on their more-than-40-year journey since their 1977 launches, they each are much farther away from Earth and the sun than Pluto.

See the fact file below for more information on The Voyager Missions or alternatively, you can download our 27-page The Voyager Missions worksheet pack to utilise within the classroom or home environment.

Key Facts & Information

Planetary Voyage

  • The National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) launched Voyager 1 and Voyager 2 in separate months in the summer of 1977 from Cape Canaveral, Florida.
  • The mission was designed to take advantage of a 175-year geometric arrangement of the outer planets in the late 1970s and the 1980s allowing a Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus and Neptune tour for a minimum trip time. 
  • With a conservative estimate of NASA technology capabilities and expensive funding, the Voyagers were originally constructed to conduct close-up studies of Jupiter and Saturn, Saturn’s rings, and their larger moons. 
  • Voyager 2 was launched first on August 20, 1977, at NASA Kennedy Space Center. It was shortly followed by Voyager 1, launching on a faster, shorter trajectory on September 5, 1977. 
  • Voyager 1 made a flyby to Jupiter on March 5, 1979, and Saturn on November 12, 1980, followed by Voyager 2 to Jupiter on July 9, 1979, and Saturn on August 25, 1981.
  • With a projected 5-year mission, and achievement of all its objectives, the additional flybys of the two outermost planets, Uranus and Neptune, proved possible through remote-control reprogramming.

The VIM

  • The Voyager Interstellar Mission (VIM) was launched after the Voyagers finished their mission in 1989, or 12 years after launch.
  • At that time, Voyager 1 was already 40 AU (Astronomical Unit – distance of Earth from the Sun, 150 million kilometers) and Voyager 2 was 31 AU from the Sun.
  • Voyager 1 is currently flying away at a speed of about 3.6 AU per year, towards the general direction of the Sun’s motion relative to nearby stars. Meanwhile, Voyager 2 flies at a slower speed of about 3.3 AU per year.
  • On August 25, 2012, Voyager 1 entered interstellar space, making it the first human-made object to explore this far. It already reached at a distance of about 122 AU, or about 11 billion miles (18 billion kilometers) from the sun. Voyager 2 reached interstellar space on November 5, 2018.
  • By 2025, with enough electrical power and thruster fuel, the Voyager 1 will be about 13.8 billion miles (22.1 billion kilometers) from the Sun and Voyager 2 will be 11.4 billion miles (18.4 billion kilometers) away.
  • Each Voyager carries a message for the extraterrestrials, prepared by scientist Carl Sagan and his team, in the form of a 12 inch (30-centimeter) diameter gold-plated copper disc.
  • It contains in 55 languages, 35 Earth sounds, 90 minutes of music, 115 images of life on Earth and greetings from US President Jimmy Carter.

Voyager 1

  • Voyager 1 was the first spacecraft in 2012 to cross the boundary where the Sun’s influence is practically gone – or past the heliosphere.
  • It is also the first human-made object to venture into interstellar space and has been flying longer than any other spacecraft in history, along with Voyager 2.
  • Within the Solar System, Voyager 1 discovered a thin ring around Jupiter and two new Jovian moons: Thebe and Metis. At Saturn, it found five new moons and a new ring called the G-ring.
  • Despite it being launched later, Voyager 1 had overtaken its twin because of a faster route on December 15, 1977, and at 44 years (in 2021) it is currently in the constellation of Ophiuchus at a distance of 154.32 AU (23.086 billion km; 14.345 billion mi) and counting.

Voyager 2

  • With their design based on the earlier spacecraft Mariners, Voyager 1 and 2 were originally the Mariner 11 and 12.
  • Voyager 2 launched on August 20, 1977, and began transmitting images of Jupiter on April 24, 1979, with its closest encounter at 400,785 miles (645,000 km).
  • It made close passes to the Jovian moons on its way into the system, such as the Callisto, Ganymede, Europa, Io, Iapetus, and Amalthea.
  • Two years after its flyby at Jupiter, Voyager 2 began sending images of Saturn on August 22, 1981, showing ring “spokes” and kinks, Saturn’s A-Ring, F-ring and its shepherding moons such as Hyperion, Enceladus, Tethys, and Phoebe as well as the recently discovered Helene, Telesto and Calypso.
  • It would take another 4.5 years for Voyager 2 to reach Uranus, making it the first human-made object to fly past the planet Uranus and its 10 newly discovered moons.
  • On August 25, 1989, encountered Neptune from about 2,980 miles (4,800 kilometers) over the cloud tops of the giant planet.
  • The Voyager 2 also revealed three major features in the planetary clouds—the Lesser Dark Spot, the Great Dark Spot, and Scooter.
  • 12 years after its planetary flybys, Voyager concluded its mission and followed a course below the ecliptic plane and out of the solar system, with its instruments put in low power mode to conserve energy.
  • After the Neptune flyby, NASA renamed the entire project the Voyager Interstellar Mission (VIM). It will continue to send messages back to Earth until all power of instruments run out, leaving the Voyagers into their eternal journeys.

The Voyager Missions Worksheets

This is a fantastic bundle that includes everything you need to know about The Voyager Missions across 27 in-depth pages. These are ready-to-use worksheets that are perfect for teaching students about The Voyager Missions where the twin Voyager 1 and 2 spacecraft have travelled much farther away from Earth and the sun than Pluto.

Complete List Of Included Worksheets

  • The Voyager Missions Facts
  • Voyager Instruments
  • The Journey of Voyager
  • Bon Voyage!
  • In the Eyes of Voyager 1
  • The Pale Blue Dot
  • The Golden Record
  • Forever Apart
  • Groovy Memory
  • The Next Voyager
  • Making Discoveries Possible

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Link will appear as The Voyager Missions Facts & Worksheets: https://kidskonnect.com - KidsKonnect, October 7, 2021

Use With Any Curriculum

These worksheets have been specifically designed for use with any international curriculum. You can use these worksheets as-is, or edit them using Google Slides to make them more specific to your own student ability levels and curriculum standards.