>> Also, the plaque was placed so that it was "behind" the spacecraft as it
>> traveled across the solar system.
>
> Interesting fact. I did not know this.
>
> When I read your post I looked up NASA's mission page. Now I am not so sure
> about the plaque anymore... I did not expect a 6000K hot gas-cloud outside
> our solar system! Never heard of "Fluff" - strange things are out there,
> indeed.
>
> What do you think of this?
>
> http://science.nasa.gov/science-news/science-at-nasa/2009/23dec_voyager/
>
> Will the gas be sufficient to melt down the spacecraft? It is quite hot, but
> is it dense enough to heat up the craft? Or will radiation cooling win?
>
>
>

In space, things are realy different than anything you can encounter 
here on Earth.
"Very High" density clouds can count less than one atom per cubic kilometer.


stripped of any electrons and traveling at relativistic speeds. Any 
space ship traveling through that may only encounter a particle every 
few seconds, at most.

Take a look at the horse head nebulae, one of the densest you can find. 
It's density is well over 10000 times that of the surrounding space, but 
still less than 1% of that in the vicinity of the moon. Around the moon, 
the best vacuum ever acheived in any laboratoty look like high presure.

The "local fluff" mentioned in that article must have a density, at the 
dencest area of the bow shock, around 100000 to 1000000 lower than that 
of the space around the earth.



Alain



Alain

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