Voyager 1 Spacecraft Thrusters Fired Up For First Time Since '80

It's a good idea to have a backup plan, especially in interstellar space. NASA scientists needed to reorient the 40-year-old Voyager 1 -- the space agency's farthest spacecraft -- so its antenna would point toward Earth, 13 billion miles away. But the "attitude control thrusters," the first option to make the spacecraft turn in space, have been wearing out.