Scientists awed by surface detail from Pluto images: Flowing glaciers, ‘Hillary’ mountains

Scientists awed by surface detail from Pluto images: Flowing glaciers, ‘Hillary’ mountains

In its final farewell to Pluto, New Horizons … [sent] an image of exotic ice across the dwarf planet’s surface, revealing signs of recent geologic activity — something scientists hoped to find but didn’t expect. ‘We’ve only seen surfaces like this on active worlds like Earth and Mars,’ said mission co-investigator John Spencer of SwRI. […]

From Pluto with love: Towering ice mountains on a heart-shaped plain

From Pluto with love: Towering ice mountains on a heart-shaped plain

[CLICK ON IMAGE FOR HIGH RESOLUTION / NASA, Johns Hopkins Univ. / APL, Southwest Research Inst. A 50 mile (80 kilometer) trip across Pluto would cover the distance indicated by the scale bar/ The close-up of the icy world’s rugged equatorial terrain was captured when the New Horizons spacecraft was about 47,800 miles (77,000 kilometers) […]

Fastest ever spaceship blasted off in 2006, passed the moon in 9 hours and took a decade to reach Pluto

Fastest ever spaceship blasted off in 2006, passed the moon in 9 hours and took a decade to reach Pluto

[CLICK ON IMAGE FOR HIGH RESOLUTION], Ben Cooper Destination: Pluto. The New Horizons spacecraft [atop a powerful Atlas V rocket] roared off its launch pad at Cape Canaveral in Florida, USA in 2006 toward adventures in the distant Solar System. The craft is the fastest spaceships ever launched by humans, having passed the Moon only […]

Excitement builds as Pluto flyby nears, a decade after launch

Excitement builds as Pluto flyby nears, a decade after launch

[CLICK ON IMAGE FOR HIGH RESOLUTION] There’s a near-perfect heart shape on Pluto’s rusty red surface which scientists are seeing for the first time as a piano-sized NASA spacecraft, New Horizons, hurtles toward the distant body on its way toward a historic flyby on July 14. … Pluto [was] once considered the farthest planet in […]