DEEP FIELDan atlas of the observable universe

07 · The interstellar ledger

Four machines that left

Only five spacecraft are on trajectories out of the solar system. Four of them — the two Voyagers and the two Pioneers — launched in the 1970s. The Voyagers still call home. The distance counters below tick in real time, propagated from NASA/JPL tracking figures for mid-2026.

Voyager 1

● transmitting

Launched September 5, 1977. Flew past Jupiter and Saturn, then climbed out of the planetary plane. Crossed into interstellar space in 2012 — the farthest human-made object in existence. In November 2026 it becomes the first machine a full light-day from Earth.

Distance from Earth now ≈—km
Signal travel time~23.6 hours
Escape speed~3.5 AU / yr

Voyager 2

● transmitting

Launched sixteen days before its twin, on August 20, 1977. The only spacecraft ever to visit Uranus and Neptune. Entered interstellar space in 2018, heading "down" out of the solar plane toward the southern sky.

Distance from Earth now ≈—km
Signal travel time~19.8 hours
Escape speed~3.1 AU / yr

Pioneer 10

○ silent since 2003

Launched March 2, 1972 — the first spacecraft to cross the asteroid belt and the first to fly past Jupiter. Its last faint signal reached Earth on January 23, 2003, from about 80 AU out. It coasts on, silent, toward the star Aldebaran.

Jupiter flybyDec 1973
CarriesThe Pioneer plaque

Pioneer 11

○ silent since 1995

Launched April 5, 1973. Used Jupiter's gravity to become the first spacecraft ever to reach Saturn, scouting the path the Voyagers would follow. Routine contact ended in 1995 when its power ran too low to point its antenna home.

Saturn flybySep 1979
CarriesThe Pioneer plaque
The Voyager Golden Record
The Golden Record — a gold-plated copper disc aboard each Voyager: greetings in 55 languages, music from Bach to Chuck Berry, and the sounds of Earth. Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech
The Pioneer plaque
The Pioneer plaque — the Pioneers' engraved message: a man, a woman, and a map of pulsars pointing back to our Sun. Credit: NASA Ames
Diagram of the Voyager 2 spacecraft instruments
The machine itself — Voyager's instrument layout, the blueprint behind the 3D model above. Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech

11 · The station

The ISS — humanity's outpost

Continuously crewed since November 2, 2000 — every human born since has always shared the sky with people living off the planet. The live tracker at the top of this page is watching this machine. Below: an interactive model of it, and a short film this page generates itself.

Schematic model · drag & zoom
Truss span109 m — a football field
Mass~420,000 kg
Speed~28,000 km/h
Sunrises per day16
First moduleZarya · 1998
Crewed sinceNov 2, 2000
One orbit, 90 seconds — a film this page draws itself Generated animation, not footage: the station crosses the day side, plunges into Earth's shadow, and meets the next sunrise — as it really does, 16 times a day. Click to pause.
The International Space Station photographed in full from a departing spacecraft
The real thing — the station photographed from a departing SpaceX Crew Dragon during a flyaround. Credit: NASA

05 · The hangar

Voyager, in three dimensions

A schematic model of the twin Voyager spacecraft — the 3.7-meter high-gain dish, the ten-sided bus carrying the Golden Record, the instrument and magnetometer booms, and the plutonium generators that still power them after nearly five decades. Drag to turn it. Scroll to zoom.

Schematic model · not to scale in every detail