NASA’s new horizons spacecraft nears historic encounter with Pluto
CANADA: As NASA’s New Horizons speeds toward Pluto, the mission team is paying careful attention to debris in the planet’s vicinity that could prove hazardous to the spacecraft in the event of an impact.
The grand piano-sized probe has traveled more than three billion miles in nearly nine-and-a-half years since its launch in January 2006.
Its closest flyby of the Pluto system will occur in just three months, on July 14-15 of this year.
Pluto has one large moon, Charon, that is half its size, and four smaller moons, Nix, Hydra, Styx, and Kerberos. Nix and Hydra were discovered the year before New Horizons launched while Styx and Kerberos were found only a few years ago.
The Pluto system may contain even more, smaller moons, plus a ring system.
Pluto’s Kuiper Belt neighborhood is home to numerous tiny icy bodies. If any of those objects collide with one or more of Pluto’s small moons, the impact would generate debris that could hit the spacecraft, which is traveling approximately 31,000 miles per hour (50,000 km per hour).
Unlike Pluto and Charon, the smaller moons do not have sufficient gravity to trap debris from such an impact on their surfaces. Instead, the debris is released back into space.
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