NASA probe set to make history at Pluto - CNN
This new image of Pluto is stunning planetary scientists. NASA says the image reveals layers of haze that are several times higher than predicted. The photo was taken by the New Horizons spacecraft seven hours after its closest approach to Pluto on Tuesday, July 14. New Horizons was about 1. 25 million miles away from Pluto at the time. Images taken of Pluto's heart-shaped feature, informally named "Tombaugh Regio," reveal a "vast, craterless plain that appears to be no more than 100 million years old," NASA said on Friday, July 17. The frozen region "is possibly still being... " NASA's New Horizons spacecraft was launched in 2006 and traveled 3 billion miles to the dwarf planet. NASA says it took four years and 20 computers operating continuously to create the image. New Horizons launched from Florida's Kennedy Space Center on January 19, 2006. The probe, about the size of a piano, weighed nearly 1,054 pounds at launch. It has seven instruments on board to take images and sample Pluto's atmosphere. Some science data was lost, including some images, he said, but the spacecraft and its instruments now are "operating flawlessly. Source: www.cnn.com
