Japestar, it's frightening how similar our thoughts are! Yes, I think that Daniel is silent because the antenna is broken. I've also considered asking the other probes (mostly Gail & Andrew) if they could try relaying messages to Daniel directly, or if there was some way to reroute Daniel's messages through another antenna.
Gail was reluctant to send back an actual picture of the platform, so we can't give any specific guidance as to how to reach it the damaged area. Maybe we could encourage her or Andrew to give us a picture so we can proceed with a bit of knowledge?
-Psiclops