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    "headline": "Voyager 1 reaches one light-day from Earth on November 18; NASA asks the world to flash V-G-R skyward",
    "description": "NASA invites people worldwide to flash V-G-R in Morse code on November 17 as Voyager 1 nears one light-day, about 16 billion miles, from Earth.",
    "datePublished": "2026-11-12T05:27:00+00:00",
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    "keywords": "Jet Propulsion Laboratory, NASA, Voyager 1, Voyager 2, Voyager Golden Record",
    "articleBody": "NASA wants the whole planet to flash a flashlight at Voyager 1. After sunset on Tuesday, November 17, the agency is asking people everywhere to point a light at the sky and blink V-G-R, the mission’s three-letter call sign, in Morse code. The occasion: a few hours later, at 5:16:07 a.m. EST on Wednesday, November 18, Voyager 1 becomes the first human-made object one light-day from Earth. NASA calls the event “Shine Bright for Voyager’s Light-Day” and pitches it as a “wave of golden light” rolling around the globe as the sunset line moves west. We looked at the milestone itself, and at Voyager 1’s Saturn flyby 46 years ago, in our earlier piece on the Saturn anniversary. This one is about joining in. How to send the signal The official instructions are simple enough for a child with a bike light. Any light works: a flashlight, glow stick, solar lantern or phone. Turn it on and off with the switch, or block it with your hand or a piece of cardboard. A dot is a quick flash of under a second; a dash lasts about one second. V: three quick flashes, then one long one (dot-dot-dot-dash). G: two long flashes, then one quick one (dash-dash-dot). R: quick, long, quick (dot-dash-dot). Leave a short gap between flashes inside a letter and at least a second between letters, then repeat for around a minute. If Morse code feels like too much, NASA has a web-based flasher you open on a phone or tablet and point upward; it blinks the call sign for you. The agency also asks people to film their signal and post it tagged @NASA, and says it hopes buildings and landmarks will join. There is a neat echo here. The Golden Record bolted to both Voyagers already carries a message in Morse code, “Ad astra per aspera,” Latin for “through struggle to the stars.” What one light-day means A light-day is a distance, not a time span: how far light travels in 24 hours. NASA puts it at 16,094,799,096 miles, or 25,902,068,356 kilometers. Once Voyager 1 crosses it, a radio command from Earth needs a full day to arrive and the reply needs another full day to come home. Our arithmetic shows how slow the spacecraft is by comparison. Voyager 1 cruises at nearly 38,000 mph. Light covers about 186,000 miles every second, so Voyager needs roughly 4.9 hours to travel the distance light crosses in one second. Put another way, Voyager 1 launched on September 5, 1977, and NASA says it will have taken 49 years, two months and 11 days to cover one light-day. That is close to 18,000 days to match a single day of light travel. Your flashlight beam will not reach the spacecraft, of course. Even if it could, it would arrive about a day later. NASA describes the flashing as a symbolic act, a shared moment rather than a working transmission. Where it is headed Voyager 1 entered interstellar space in August 2012 and is drifting toward a dim star called Gliese 445 in the Little Dipper, more than 17 light-years away. It will pass within about 1.7 light-years of that star in 40,000 years. Its twin, Voyager 2, took a slower route past Uranus and Neptune and should reach one light-day in November 2035. To picture where Voyager 1 is on the night, NASA’s November skywatching guide says to look toward the constellation Ophiuchus in the west around 5 p.m. That same guide also covers this week’s meteor showers and other sky events. The flashing starts after sunset on November 17; the crossing comes at 5:16 a.m. EST the next morning. Further reading NASA: Shine Bright for Voyager’s Light-Day NASA: What Is a Light-Day? Illustrative image. Image: NASA/JPL-Caltech, Public domain via Wikimedia Commons This article was produced with AI assistance and reviewed by our Editorial Desk. How we work.",
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