Pluto Flyby
Today the 14th of July, the spacecraft New Horizons will be having a flyby across the planet Pluto (wait! Pluto is no longer officially a planet, as of 2006 it is demoted to a dwarf planet in our Solar System).
(Pluto viewed from New Horizons)
This is a significant event happening, 25 years after the last similar event when the spacecraft Voyager 2 made a flyby near Neptune (currently the official furthest planet from the Sun).
Since New Horizons was launched in 2006 (7 months before Pluto is demoted to a dwarf planet), the spacecraft has traveled more 3 billion miles. After nine and a half years traveling it finally arrived, and will be sending information and images from this celestial object that was discovered by Clyde Tombaugh in 1930. The spacecraft will also make a flyby near Pluto's largest moon, Charon, which is actually considered big since it is about half the size of Pluto itself!
(Pluto and Charon viewed from New Horizons)
News of this fly-by is the hot topic now with many magazines publishing it as the cover story...
Google search has a doodle on this event...
Hopefully with the images sent by New Horizons we will get a better understanding about this dwarf planet.
To learn more about Pluto check out:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pluto
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