NASA Shuts Down Voyager 1 Instrument to Preserve Power for Interstellar Journey

NASA turned off Voyager 1's Low-energy Charged Particles experiment (LECP) on April 17 to conserve dwindling power. The spacecraft, launched in 1977, is now 15.8 billion miles from Earth—the most distant human-made object. Its plutonium-powered generator loses about four watts per year, and power margins are critically slim. In February, a sudden drop risked triggering an automated shutdown of components, which would require a risky recovery. Engineers at JPL opted to power down LECP, which measures ions, electrons, and cosmic rays. Data from the instrument helped understand the interstellar medium; Voyager 1 entered interstellar space in 2012, Voyager 2 in 2018. Voyager 2's LECP was turned off in March 2025. Both probes started with ten instruments; seven had been previously shut down on each. Voyager 1 now has two remaining instruments: a plasma wave detector and a magnetometer. Shutdown commands took about 23 hours to reach the probe, and the power-down lasted 3 hours 15 minutes. The team is developing a larger energy-saving strategy called "the Big Bang," which would turn off several devices simultaneously and switch to lower-power alternatives. Voyager 1 might receive this treatment as early as July, potentially allowing LECP to be reactivated. NASA left part of the instrument alive to facilitate revival. Program manager Suzanne Dodd aims for the spacecraft to reach its 50th anniversary from launch.