New Horizons: Pre-launch, launch and main cruise, Pluto and the Kuiper belt Options

[cIclops]

Yes it's happening after all these years, the mission to the last planet!

And maybe to celebrate the confirmation of budget, NASA approval preparations and the fueling of the RTG (radioisotope thermoelectric generator), there is an updated web site at http://pluto.jhuapl.edu/

Launch will be January 2006 with arrival at the Pluto Charon system July 2015 (mark your calender!) and then on through the Kuiper belt during 2016-2020 and beyond.

20.8-centimeter telescope for 100m resolution at closest approach
IR/UV spectrometers
2 x 8GB data recorders
data rate: 768 bps (sic) to 70m DSN
465kg including fuel
$650m

336 days to launch

[Guest_BruceMoomaw_*]

I attended the 2003 DPS meeting -- and, specifically, the special session on science goals for NH's Jupiter flyby. The impression I got is that the most interesting aspect of that flyby will be, not its imaging of the moons, but its near-IR spectra of them -- which will be much better than those from either Galileo or Cassini (better instrument than the former; much closer than the latter), and may well provide us with very interesting new data on their surface compositions.