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Voyager 1 overcomes its latest challenge to keep operating more than 15 billion miles away

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NASA engineers have successfully restored contact with Voyager 1 and the spacecraft is operating normally.

The aging probe automatically switched from its primary X-band radio transmitter and began relying on a much weaker S-band transmitter.

Voyager 1 is currently exploring uncharted territory about 15.4 billion miles ( 24.9 billion kilometers ) away.

The Voyager team has computer models to help them predict how much power the spacecraft’s heaters and instruments are expected to use.

The fact that turning on one heater triggered the fault protection system is a signal to the team that the probe's future is more uncertain than they realized.

Voyager 1 and its twin send back science data continuously through the Deep Space Network .