Five years ago today — January 19, 2006 — we sent a deep space probe from Cape Canaveral to rendezvous with Pluto and study the Kuiper Belt.
(Artist’s conception of the New Horizons spacecraft in the vicinity of Pluto. NASA image from the Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory/Southwest Research Institute.)
New Horizons launched atop an Atlas-5 rocket on its way to Pluto and Charon (Pluto’s moon). It will reach Pluto in July 2015, where it will map Pluto, study its atmosphere and other characteristics, and continue on to other objects in the Kuiper Belt.
This page has compelling details about the mission, including a countdown to the rendezvous and the mission’s Twitter feed.
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