There’s a section of the upcoming SpaceX post about the impending New Horizons arrival to Pluto, but since that’s happening Tuesday morning and the post won’t be up yet, here’s the deal:
New Horizons is a probe launched toward Pluto in 2006, and after almost a decade of journeying through the Solar System, New Horizons will finally reach Pluto on Tuesday morning (July 14). The probe won’t land on Pluto, but it’ll do a close fly-by, capturing a plethora of detailed photos along the way.
Why does this matter? First, Pluto is quite a fascinating concept. Second, many people may not realize that every time they’ve seen a detailed image of Pluto, it’s actually been an artist’s interpretation, not an actual photograph. This is because Pluto is so distant that not even the powerful Hubble Telescope, capable of revealing intricate images of galaxies billions of light years away, can provide a close-up view of Pluto.
To provide some perspective: Pluto is 7.5 billion km away from Earth and has a diameter of 2,368 km. If you scale down both numbers by a billion, it’s like attempting to observe the surface texture of an object that is 7.5 km away and only 2.368 mm across. This is akin to trying to take a clear photo of a single grain of sand levitating above 93rd St. in Manhattan using a telescope positioned on 1st St.—all in dim lighting.
Up until this week, the best image we’ve had of Pluto was:
Over the past few days, as New Horizons nears Pluto, it continues to transmit increasingly detailed images—each new image received provides the best view of Pluto we have ever had. Here’s the latest:
You can keep track of everything here. For a more detailed explanation, check Kottke.