How Long Does It Take to Get to Neptune? NASA Reveals the Journey Duration

Novina Putri Bestari, CNBC Indonesia

Tech

Tuesday, 08/08/2023 11:05 WIB

Photo: Neptunus. Doc: solarsystem.nasa

Jakarta, CNBC Indonesia – It took a very long time to get to Neptune. NASA revealed that Earth’s journey to the last planet of the solar system took 12 years.

Neptune is the last full-sized planet discovered. The way to find it is also quite unique, not by looking through a telescope but by a mathematical formula.

The distance to Earth is more than 4 billion kilometers. That is, when you are on the same side or the closest distance is 4.3 billion kilometers, while when you are on the opposite side it reaches 4.7 billion.

No wonder it took so long to get to Neptune. This has been proven during NASA’s Voyager 2 journey.

The plane took off from Earth on August 20, 1977 and only reached Neptune on August 25, 1989, quoted from the NASA website, Tuesday (8/8/2023).

Voyager 2 headed for Neptune at an average speed of 19 km per second. After five hours, the probe also ‘stopped’ on the planet’s largest moon named Triton.

On its way, Voyager 2 also passed other planets. Namely on Jupiter in 1979 and 1981 arrived at Saturn.

The journey continued and it was only five years later that Voyager 2 arrived at Uranus. The plane spent another three years until it reached Neptune.

However, 34 years after the spacecraft arrived at Neptune, Voyager 2 is known to have lost contact with the Earth station. This occurred after a command error resulted in Voyager 2 tilting its antennae to a point two degrees from Earth and ultimately being unable to receive commands from Earth.

After some time, NASA finally managed to track and communicate with Voyager 2. “NASA’s Deep Space Network, a giant worldwide radio antenna, picked up a “heartbeat signal”, which means the 46-year-old craft is alive and operational,” said project manager Suzanne Dodd, quoted from APNews.

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