Exactly 40 years before today the first
Voyager space probe (which was called Voyager 2; Voyager 1 started 16 days after Voyager 2) launched. At a distance of about 115 AU (1.72?10[SUP]10[/SUP] km) from the Sun
as of August 2017, Voyager 2 is one of the most distant human-made objects, along with Voyager 1 (~139.5 AU as of August 2017; still working), New Horizons (~39 AU as of August 2017; still working), Pioneer 10 (estimated 114 AU as of January 2016; last contact in January 2003) and Pioneer 11 (estimated around 95.3 AE as of February 2016; last contact in November 1995).
It seems the optimism of the 1970's has been lost since the probe New Horizon which started in 2006 doesn't carry any form of message to a possible alien life form.
