LOST IN SPACE: NASA Regains Contact With ‘Dead’ Solar Mission.

A signal from the long-lost spacecraft, called STEREO-B, was detected Sunday evening (Aug. 21) by NASA’s Deep Space Network, a collection of space tracking stations that follows the agency’s space missions across the solar system and beyond. NASA scientists had kept vigil for STEREO-B, making monthly searches for the probe until it phoned home Sunday at 6:57 p.m. EDT (2257 GMT).

Right now, it’s unclear how healthy the spacecraft is after drifting in space for nearly two years. NASA lost contact with it on Oct. 1, 2014, after commanding a reset from Earth. The spacecraft’s twin, STEREO-A, is still working normally.

“The STEREO Missions Operations team plans further recovery processes to assess observatory health, re-establish attitude control, and evaluate all subsystems and instruments,” NASA officials wrote in a statement.

Evidently the spacecraft became disoriented, and as a result can’t keep its solar arrays directed at the sun for long enough to recharge its battery.

Or it could be the beginning of a real-life sci-fi horror movie.