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From: tneff@bfmny0.UUCP (Tom Neff)
Newsgroups: sci.astro,sci.space
Subject: Re: Voyager Interstellar Trajectory
Message-ID: <14604@bfmny0.UUCP>
Date: 29 Aug 89 05:18:41 GMT
References: <7525@ecsvax.UUCP> <44600002@primerd> <980@corpane.UUCP> <4255@utastro.UUCP> <62446@philabs.Philips.Com>
Reply-To: tneff@bfmny0.UU.NET (Tom Neff)
Followup-To: sci.astro
Organization: ^
Lines: 29

Casey and others have it right.  The superficially silly assertion that
FIRST Voyager will make its closest approach to Barnard's Star and THEN
it will pass through the Oort cloud, is trivially true because Voyager
is hardly heading towards Barnard's star at all!  Its technically
closest approach to BS will occur about 1ly out, and the Oort cloud, if
it exists, is about 1.25ly out.  (If you believe current thinking
anyway.)

The only "real" approach on the books is with a little red dwarf called
Ross 248 and that's 40k years away, with a 1.7ly approach.  If humanity
is still around 40k years from now, all space within 100ly of earth will
probably be subdivided 3 dimensionally for condos and Voyager will be
netted and braked and warehoused for the public safety. :-)

Seriously, all of this is moot.  The sole remaining event of interest is
the heliopause encounter, and that is of great interest indeed so it's
vital that power conservation take hold once Neptune dwindles to
impracticable viewing size.  The RTG decay figures appear to make it a
race between crossing the solar wind boundary -- a vital shot at
understanding the nature of the interstellar medium -- and underwattage
fatal to transmission.  I predict that if the funding holds, the
struggle to win the heliopause race will rival all the behind the scenes
Voyager heroics heretofore.

And I renew the call for MEDALS FOR THE VOYAGER TEAM!  Let's have a
goddamn "phone tree alert" about something REAL!
-- 
"We walked on the moon --	((	Tom Neff
	you be polite"		 )) 	tneff@bfmny0.UU.NET