==Helping us to understand the vastness of the universe.´´

 

For example, when Voyager was transported to the Delta quadrant (by an alien entity, known as the Caretaker), they found themselves more than 70,000 light years from Earth. Although this is a vast distance away, it was still only about two thirds of the way across our Milky Way galaxy.

 

When they eventually set off for home, they knew that it would take them around 70 years to get back to Earth at an average of Warp 6 (roughly 975 times the speed of light).

 

They were limited to averaging Warp 6 because this was Voyager's safe high duration (non harmful) top speed. Although Voyager could travel much faster than this - up to W9.975 - it was only possible for short periods, or quick bursts due to pressure on the warp engines and their limited supply of dilithium.

 

If they were able to travel at Voyager's absolute maximum warp factor non-stop, then the journey time could have been reduced to just 16 years.

 

But what really blows your mind, is when you convert this to realistic terms in the 21st century. The fastest man-made space object to date, is the Helios 2 probe, which reached a maximum velocity of 253,000mph. If that probes set off from the Delta quadrant on a journey back to Earth when Apes were just starting to walk upright at the beginning of the Neogene epoch around about 6 million years ago..

.. the probe still wouldn't have reached by today.

 

In fact, it would have to set off around about the middle Jurassic period when dinosaurs were walking the Earth - or around 185 MILLION YEARS ago before it could reach Earth by today.

 

And now that we know that, let's put space travel into perspective. If Helios 2 wanted to travel to the nearest star Alpha Centauri, travelling at its top speed of 253,000mph, it would take about 10,500 years..

.. on Saturn V only reached 1/10 of that speed on its journey to the moon. Meaning that, if we were to travel at that same speed, it would take us over 100,000 years to reach Alpha Centauri.

 

At Warp 6 Voyager could do the same journey in 9.7 hours. At Warp 9.975, the journey would take just over 2 hours.

 

And that's just 4.22 light years away.

 

The Milky Way galaxy is about 105,000 light years across. Travelling at Warp 6, a journey across the galaxy from one side to the other would take more than 107 years.

If one were able to travel non-stop at Warp 9.975, more than 4300 times the speed of light, it would still take more than 24 years!

 

And that's just to cross our own little Galaxy. Travelling at more than 799 MILLION MILES per second. That's nearly 9 times to the Sun and back - in just 1 second. And just for reference, remember that at Saturn V's top speed, it would take more than 8 months just to reach the Sun - ONCE.

 

The vastness of the Universe becomes apparent when one thinks in these terms.

 

Our nearest galaxy not gravitationally bound to our own (i.e., not a satellite galaxy), is the Andromeda (M31) spiral. It is around 2.6 million light years from our own. If you were unlucky enough to be transported to the Andromeda galaxy by an alien, then at Warp 6 - more than 900 times the speed of light - your journey home would take nearly 2700 years..!!

 

… And at Warp 9.975 it would still take you an incredible 603 years. And that's just to our nearest non-satellite galaxy.

 

Just think about that for a second. No, really think about it. In the time it takes you to read this paragraph, light would have travelled more than 2 million miles.

 

Light, which travels at 669 million miles per hour, can travel from London to New York in half the time it takes you to blink. Can orbit the equator seven times - in less than ONE second. Can get from the Earth to the Sun (93 million miles) and back….

…Three times - and then still have enough time left over to make it most of the way back to the Sun again..

In just ONE HOUR.

 

So, Captain Janeway, your 70 year journey might have seemed long on your way back from the Delta quadrant, but just grant yourself lucky that the Caretaker wasn't in a different Galaxy altogether - like Andromeda.

 

So, if it took more than 600 years to reach our nearest non-satellite galaxial neighbour, the Andromeda galaxy, travelling at more than 4300 times the speed of light (Warp 9.975), then just imagine how long it would take to reach the biillions of other galaxies in the observable universe.

 

They could be hundreds, or even thousands of times further away than the Andromeda Galaxy.

 

So Voyager's journey home could have taken millions of years, even travelling at maximum warp.

 

And that's just the observable universe..