Voyager 2
Will Voyager 2 escape ???
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littlebang
I have made a few attempts to find out about escape velocity and have not learned much yet . From what I have been able to get , Voyager is / was traveling at about 16 kms per second .
I then checked the speed of Haleys Comet, 70 kms per second.
If Haley keeps coming back every 80 years or so , why won't Voyager 2 . Have I got my facts wrong , does anybody know Voyagers current speed , or where I should go to get these details .
Seems to me Voyager is coming home , if I'm right it will be slowing down or stopping soon and starting the return journey???
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replied to:  littlebang
littlebang
Replied to:  I have made a few attempts to find out about escape...
It appears Halley is not a good example , maybe a long-period comet would have made the point better .I have worked out that Voyager will travel for 20,000 years before reaching the half way point between us and it's first star .And for most of that 20,000 years it will be a dead piece of metal with no propulsion . Long-period comets can have cycles of thousands of years , one website suggested that our solar systems gravitational field is out to 3.5 light years . It will take Voyager a little more than 20,000 years to reach that point .So I still feel the chances of Voyager escaping our solar systems gravitational influence are not good .
Andromeda , about 2.5 million light years away is going to collide with our milky way Galaxy , because the gravity will pull us together . If something 2.5 million light years away can have that much effect . How is Voyager not going to be dragged back by our gravity???
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