Don’t forget: It’s always possible that in a couple centuries the Voyager could be found by an advanced civilization, upgraded almost beyond our comprehension, then return to Earth to wreak its terrible vengeance. (Check out “Star Trek the Motion Picture” for the possible outcome.)
The Voyager probes may be moving fast in terms of the speed of things commonly found moving on Earth, but I wouldn’t say they were moving all that more fast in comparison to the speeds of other objects in space. After all, the Earth itself is moving through space at about the speed of 67,000 mph (107,000 kph)—not exactly something you’d want to get clipped by at such speeds.
But this basically means that both Voyager probes might as well be regarded the same as a common asteroid heading towards a planet. It’ll not be so much its speed of approach that’s the danger, it’ll be it’s angle of approach—approach the planet from the wrong angle and any atmosphere the planet has is viable to either deflect the object or break up or burn up the object before it hits ground, minimizing the impact—as well as it’s overall mass, as obviously the bigger and more massive it is, the higher chance that object has of messing up whatever it comes into contact with. In comparison to the mass of most asteroids, the Voyager probes are rather small and delicate and thus would break up fairly easily in a lot of circumstances.
Finally, because of the same effect that T-Rex mentions was used to accelerate the Voyager probes to such speeds, a slingshot maneuver around the gravity well of another planet, the same sort of effect can happen as it approaches another planet to again change its speed, and if its on an impact course, there’s a good chance it’d end up getting slowed down a bit before impact anyway.
Besides, both Voyager probes were deliberately set on courses that would NOT take them near ANY of the known stars neighboring us in our region of space, so it’s not likely to enter any star systems with planets anytime soon anyway.
In short, the danger of collision with the Voyager probes isn’t totally absent…but it is pretty negligible. It’s pretty safe assuming most of this would similarly apply to any alien-made probes similarly ejected from their home star systems.
Claymore Premium Member 3 months ago
Don’t forget: It’s always possible that in a couple centuries the Voyager could be found by an advanced civilization, upgraded almost beyond our comprehension, then return to Earth to wreak its terrible vengeance. (Check out “Star Trek the Motion Picture” for the possible outcome.)
scyphi26 3 months ago
The Voyager probes may be moving fast in terms of the speed of things commonly found moving on Earth, but I wouldn’t say they were moving all that more fast in comparison to the speeds of other objects in space. After all, the Earth itself is moving through space at about the speed of 67,000 mph (107,000 kph)—not exactly something you’d want to get clipped by at such speeds.
But this basically means that both Voyager probes might as well be regarded the same as a common asteroid heading towards a planet. It’ll not be so much its speed of approach that’s the danger, it’ll be it’s angle of approach—approach the planet from the wrong angle and any atmosphere the planet has is viable to either deflect the object or break up or burn up the object before it hits ground, minimizing the impact—as well as it’s overall mass, as obviously the bigger and more massive it is, the higher chance that object has of messing up whatever it comes into contact with. In comparison to the mass of most asteroids, the Voyager probes are rather small and delicate and thus would break up fairly easily in a lot of circumstances.
Finally, because of the same effect that T-Rex mentions was used to accelerate the Voyager probes to such speeds, a slingshot maneuver around the gravity well of another planet, the same sort of effect can happen as it approaches another planet to again change its speed, and if its on an impact course, there’s a good chance it’d end up getting slowed down a bit before impact anyway.
Besides, both Voyager probes were deliberately set on courses that would NOT take them near ANY of the known stars neighboring us in our region of space, so it’s not likely to enter any star systems with planets anytime soon anyway.
In short, the danger of collision with the Voyager probes isn’t totally absent…but it is pretty negligible. It’s pretty safe assuming most of this would similarly apply to any alien-made probes similarly ejected from their home star systems.
RonBerg13 Premium Member 3 months ago
The Universe is a Dark Forest filled with Hunters.
We should not be revealing our presence and/or our location in any way, shape, or form.
But, it is probably too late now.