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NAYRarts t1_j7fh5ln wrote

We kind of have done a voyager 3. We sent the New Horizons mission to Pluto and a Kepler belt object and it is continuing to explore as it heads towards Interstellar space.

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fredzyN2 t1_j7fikbk wrote

This, New Horizons is almost the same thing. It will take such a long time for it to get anywhere interstellarly interesting, and I'm not sure there is a whole lot else to be gleaned from deep space cruising with the newer technology. Looking more closely at the things in our back yard that we don't yet understand is generally better bang for buck than sending out fly-by probes.

One other thing, I think we're about out of Plutonium 238. That's the stuff that makes long-term deep space probes possible. It's super effective for RTG's - the radioisotope thermoelectric generators that power space craft/probes like the Voyagers. I heard they were going to start making more a while ago, not sure if that situation ever improved. Basically all the Pu238 we ever had was a byproduct of cold-war era nuclear weapons production, which thankfully ceased at the end of the cold war.

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