Team members of NASA’s New Horizons celebrate success probe Photo: PAP / EPA / BILL INGALLS / NASA
On the American space agency NASA (www.nasa.gov), you can also see pictures taken when approaching the probe to Pluto. With the approach of the probe to the planet image quality increased. The best early pictures of the dwarf planets come from the Hubble Space Telescope. There are, however, very sharp, like divided into pixels balls of light.
According to NASA spacecraft past Pluto in just over 12 thousand. km at a speed of 31 km / h. Programmed it so that passed the dwarf planet and began her research on the more distant from Earth.
The first sign of the success of the mission was a 15-minute series of information provided to mission control at Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory in Maryland. Scientists so preprogrammed instruments New Horizons to gather up a large amount of data, and communication with Earth established only when the spacecraft passes Pluto and its moons.
The official information about the success came 13 hours after the close-up probe to Pluto (which took place on Tuesday in the chair. 13:49). At the moment, mission controllers waited with great anticipation – signal probes have since overcome the distance nearly 5 billion km.
– The probe is healthy – announced Chief Operating mission Alice Bowman, drowned out by the applause of colleagues gathered in the agency. – Poll is full of pictures. We can not wait – told reporters director. John NASA research Grunsfeld. – It’s a poignant moment in history – said Grunsfeld at an earlier press conference.
– We made it! Let us take compliments! – He echoed scientific manager of New Horizons mission, Alan Stern of the Southwest Research Institute in Boulder (Colorado state). – His great success today zainspirowaliśmy whole new generation of researchers, and now look discoveries yet to come – stressed the head of NASA, Charles Bolden. “This is an historic victory for science and exploration. Once again raised the bar potential of humanity.”
Stephen Hawking, NASA congratulated the maximum approximation of the New Horizons spacecraft to Pluto. Eminent scientist said he can not wait to see what manage to discover through this journey. – Now, the solar system will become for us more open, revealing the secrets of distant Pluto. The discovery of the New Horizons spacecraft may help us better understand how they formed our solar system – said Stephen Hawking.
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Tuesday’s flight He allowed the first such close encounter with Pluto. During the flight spacecraft took the pictures and data collected through which scientists can determine the composition of the surface and atmosphere of the dwarf planet. There will also detailed maps of Pluto and its moon, Charon. The probe also examines four small moons outside Pluto’s names: Styx, Nix, Kerberos, and Hydra.
The data provided so far by the New Horizons helped confirm that the diameter of Pluto is 2370 km, so it is approx. 80 km more than estimated.
Experts point out that the passage of the probe next to Pluto is one of the key moments in the history of space exploration. This means that all the celestial bodies of the solar system, from Mercury after Pluto, they have released at least one visit to the probe.
New Horizons probe was launched from Earth in January 2006. In December 2014,., After the defeat of less than 5 billion kilometers, it was woken from hibernation and begin preparations for flight in the vicinity of Pluto.
IAR, PAP, kh
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