I ran a few research tasks at JPL, small dollar studies. We'd often recruit part time work from engineers around the lab through informal networks, (instead of the official channels that segment by "specialization").
One year, one of the developers on my task was the apparently last person who could encode the command sequences for Voyager 2 (hoping memory serves me correctly - event though it was only 8 years ago). She would occasionally come late to meetings because they were dealing with some trouble with the old satellite.
Pretty amazing how little is set aside for these projects that most the staff keeping it alive have "day jobs". I hope she's still uploading
To be fair, nearly all of the science payloads on Voyager 1 & 2 have been shut down. The probes are doing very little. The doesn't take away from the very unique science they are doing but its a far cry from what the program offices were doing in 30-40 years ago. I'd expect anyone working on a Voyager probe in 2026 to need something else to do most of the day.
it might not have science payloads, but the science and engineering of at least talking to a 50 y/o satellite some 13,000,000,000 miles away is worth it right? right?
not to be that guy but I have faith a powerful AI could understand all the ins and outs of the voyager code no matter what language
Not to be that other guy, but AI might take a few tries, and you really might not get a 2nd try with these probes.
> You're right! That sequence does brick Voyager 2's CCS. Let's try ....
Based on what documentation?
Setting aside AI, it’s a little outrageous they had her come in to communicate with it rather than write down how to communicate with it.
In most cases that would indicate an organizational failure. However, if something is trillions of miles away, and wrong commands could break communication etc, I'd probably just stick with the most experienced person as well.
I think it's incredibly naive to assume there's not documentation. Maybe look into NASA and the Voyager 2 program a bit.
Experts aren't made from reading a data sheet or process doc. Competence in performing a critical task comes from actually doing the task in practice and for real.
Some would call that an organizational failure. I suppose it depends on the budgets.
There’s money to go around!