New Horizons - mission to Pluto and the Kupier belt

cIclops · 2008-02-23 12:15:26

New Horizons Crosses 9 AU - 21 Feb 2008

New Horizons passed a planetary milepost today at 5 a.m. EST when it reached a distance of 9 astronomical units (AU) from the Sun – about 836.6 million miles, or nine times the distance from the Earth to the Sun. “The spacecraft destined for the ninth planet is now just beyond 9 AU and continuing outbound for the solar system’s frontier at more than 60,000 kilometers per hour!” says New Horizons Principal Investigator Alan Stern, of NASA Headquarters.
New Horizons has covered nearly 970.5 million miles (1.56 billion kilometers) since its launch from Cape Canaveral Air Force Station, Fla., on January 19, 2006. Speeding toward Pluto at about 42,000 miles (67,500 kilometers) per hour, New Horizons will zip past the orbit of Saturn – where the Cassini spacecraft now operates – on June 8. That crossing will make New Horizons the farthest spacecraft on its way to or at its primary target.
New Horizons itself won’t have long to enjoy this latest accomplishment, though, as mission operators will put the spacecraft into regularly scheduled hibernation this afternoon at 3:50 p.m. EST

Terraformer · 2008-02-23 13:43:32

Will it pass Voyager or Pioneer probes on its way to Interstellar Space?

RedStreak · 2008-02-24 01:22:36

Will it pass Voyager or Pioneer probes on its way to Interstellar Space?

Not very likely considering how much distance the others have crossed and the extremely differing trajectories.

Terraformer · 2008-02-24 07:22:32

I meant will it get further than the probes. Is it going faster?

cIclops · 2008-02-24 09:58:20

Both Voyagers are getting close to Interstellar space, so New Horizons won't beat them there. Also Voyager 1 is fastest leaving the solar system at 3.6 AU per year (Voyager 2 is traveling at 3.3 AU per year)

AFAIK New Horizons will be slower than both, although it was launched faster it only had one gravity assist. It's current speed is 18.83 kms/sec which is about 4 AU per year, but it is slowing it down as it climbs out of the solar gravity well. Voyager 1 will be the furthest human made object for a long time.

Excelsior · 2014-06-18 00:33:36

Hubble tasked to find target for New Horizons probe

NASA has directed the Hubble Space Telescope to scan the outer frontier of the solar system for a second destination for the New Horizons space probe after it records historic first-time views of Pluto on a flyby next year.
But what comes next for New Horizons is undecided.
When scientists proposed the New Horizons mission, they sold the $728 million project partially on its ability to fly beyond Pluto, scouting a region of the solar system never before visited by a manmade spacecraft.
The probe has enough propellant to slightly change its path after the Pluto flyby to approach an object in the Kuiper Belt, a donut-shaped ring of icy worlds lying beyond the orbit of Neptune. Scientists consider Pluto itself a resident of the Kuiper Belt, along with dwarf planets like Eris, Makemake and other worlds detected in the last few years billions of miles from the sun.
But officials planning the New Horizons mission have not found a suitable object close enough to the probe's flight path, prompting a last-ditch request for observing time on the Hubble Space Telescope to search for a potential target after next year's visit to Pluto.

To bad it wasn't planned as an orbital mission.

Excelsior · 2014-07-03 16:44:09

Good signs...

Sen—The Hubble Space Telescope has successfully shown it can find new Kuiper Belt Objects (KBO) by spotting two of them in a trial run.
The achievement means it can now be used to conduct an intensive search for a suitable outer Solar System object that the New Horizons spacecraft could visit after it zips past Pluto in July 2015.
From June 16 to June 26, the New Horizons team used Hubble to perform a preliminary search to see how abundant small Kuiper Belt Objects are in the vast outer rim of our solar system.
Hubble looked at 20 areas of the sky to identify any small KBOs. The team analyzed each of pilot program images with software tools that sped up the KBO identification process.
Hubble's sharp vision and unique sensitivity allowed very faint KBOs to be identified as they drifted against the far more distant background stars, objects that had previously eluded searches by some of the world's largest ground-based telescopes.

Lets hope they find something substantial.

SpaceNut · 2015-01-01 18:05:22

Speeding through the outer solar system after a nine-year trek from Earth, Traveling at light speed, the radio signal took 4 hours and 26 minutes to reach Earth to get New Horizons awake for Pluto encounter after rousing it from hibernation more than 2.9 billion miles from Earth. With the beginning of its mission’s primary objective: exploration of Pluto and its many moons in 2015.

The robotic spacecraft is due to arrive July 14, 2015. With a seven-instrument science payload that includes advanced imaging infrared and ultraviolet spectrometers, a compact multicolor camera, a high-resolution telescopic camera, two powerful particle spectrometers and a space-dust detector. New Horizons’ closest approach to Pluto will occur on July 14.

SpaceNut · 2015-03-11 20:45:40

Pluto-bound probe tweaks its trajectory

NASA’s New Horizons spacecraft fine-tuned its path toward Pluto on Tuesday, firing its rocket thrusters for 93 seconds to aim for a fleeting flyby of the distant dwarf planet July 14.
The trajectory correction maneuver was successful, slowing the speed of New Horizons by 1.14 meters per second, or 2.5 mph.
The probe’s closest approach to Pluto moved back 14 minutes and 30 seconds after the maneuver, which also adjusted the spacecraft’s aim point by more than 2,000 miles to hit its narrow target to get the best science data during the one-shot encounter.
“The shift was based on the latest orbit predictions of Pluto and its largest moon Charon, estimated from various sources, including optical navigation images of the Pluto system taken by New Horizons in January and February,” the statement said.
The New Horions spacecraft — about the size and shape of a grand piano — is traveling 3 billion miles from Earth. It is now 93 million miles from Pluto, the same distance between the Earth and the sun.

SpaceNut · 2015-07-12 09:19:41

Keeping up with a tradition, back when we were really more active all the unmanned probes got attention as to how they could be applied to going to Mars in some way or another...

We are drawing near to the flyby and we have learned so much since pluto was demoted to dwarf status.... New Horizons has traveled 3 billion miles to reach Pluto — nearly 10 years of travel at speeds of up to 100,000 mph. It is closing in on Pluto at 38,000 mph. On Tuesday at 4:49 a.m. Arizona time, it will come within 7,750 miles of Pluto, with all its cameras and scientific instruments trained on the planet’s surface for a one-time flyby. It will be brief. Pluto, two-thirds the size of Earth’s moon, is only 1,471 miles in diameter and the spacecraft will be traveling at 31,000 mph.

Nasa New Horizon Space probe set to make history

more than nine years to get there and it will only stay a few hours, but a small space probe already is revolutionizing the way we look at Pluto.
NASA's New Horizons spacecraft will be within 6,200 miles (9,978 kilometers) of Pluto's surface at 7:49 a.m. ET on July 14 -- Tuesday -- becoming the first spacecraft to do a flyby of the icy world.
It also will pass about 17,000 miles from Pluto's largest moon, Charon.
"The data is going to start raining down from the sky," Alan Stern, the mission's principal investigator.
Pluto is eccentric.
It circles the sun in an elongated and tilted orbit. For about 20 percent of its 248-year journey around the sun, it is within the orbit of Neptune. At its farthest distance it is nearly 50 times the distance from Earth to the sun.
It is unique. Its biggest moon, Charon, is so close by that the two revolve around each other and are considered by some scientists to be a double planet. Pluto also holds clues to the formation of our solar system.

New Pluto images may reignite debate over dwarf planet status

The debate over Pluto's status in the solar system never seems to end with the question which still remains: Is Pluto a planet?

"We're close enough now that we're just starting to see Pluto's geology," New Horizons program scientist Curt Niebur said in a news release.
The purpose of the mission is to better understand where Pluto and its moons figure into the rest of the solar system, and the images could help scientists determine what Pluto's atmosphere is made of and what its surface looks like.
The International Astronomical Union's official definition states that a planet:
• Is in orbit around the sun.
• Is round or nearly round.
• Has "cleared the neighborhood" around its orbit, meaning it is not surrounded by objects of similar size and characteristics.
Supporters of Pluto's status as a full-fledged planet are hopeful the New Horizons images will bolster their case to reinstate Pluto.

RobertDyck · 2015-07-12 11:48:20

SpaceNut wrote:

Supporters of Pluto's status as a full-fledged planet are hopeful the New Horizons images will bolster their case to reinstate Pluto.

I could argue that Eris is larger than Pluto, so if Pluto is a planet then so is Eris. I could also argue that the astronomer who discovered that body called it Xena. Yes, it was named after a TV character. But if you insist on ancient mythology, the name Xena is based on a minor character from Greek mythology: Xenia. All the major names are used, and this name starts with "X", the Roman numeral for 10. It's the 10th planet. And correct spelling is in the Greek alphabet, anything in English is a translation, so Xenia or Xena depends how you translate. The main reason I argue this is that the person who discovered it gets to name it. The fact the International Astronautical Union had a temper tantrum and rejected a name based on a TV character, doesn't matter. The person who discovered it gets to name it. If you don't like the name, then you go discover something. Another complaint is that "Eris" is too close to the name of the asteroid "Eros". Very confusing.

But all these are old arguments. I lost long ago. Move on.

SpaceNut · 2015-07-12 16:06:24

International Astronomical Union continued either What to Name planet 10? or International Astronomical Union

Tom Kalbfus · 2015-07-13 19:44:35

One thing for sure, Pluto is ccold!
nh-color-pluto-charon-1024x536.jpg&w=1484
Bears a certain resemblance to Mars, and it turns out Pluto is bigger than actually thought, its bigger that Eris, unless Eris is also bigger than we thought it was too.
As for its surface features, since Pluto is the God of wealth and the underworld, what do you think the various craters and other surface features would be named after?
How about deceased billionaires? Howard Hughes Crater? Rockefeller Crater Andrew Carnegie Crater, J.P. Morgan Crater, how do those sound?

Tom Kalbfus · 2015-07-14 10:15:33

Hello, Pluto! NASA Spacecraft Makes Historic Dwarf Planet Flyby

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SPACE.com
By Mike Wall
4 hours ago
046d1bb0-2a39-11e5-aca3-7f3c971afb6c_2015-07-14T141030Z_1856203939_GF10000158948_RTRMADP_3_SPACE-PLUTO.JPG

Pluto nearly fills the frame in this image from the Long Range Reconnaissance Imager (LORRI) aboard NASA's New Horizons spacecraft, taken on July 13, 2015, when the spacecraft was 476,000 miles (768,000 kilometers) from the surface and released on July 14, 2015. More than nine years after its launch, the U.S. spacecraft sailed past Pluto on Tuesday, capping a 3 billion mile (4.88 billion km) journey to the solar system´s farthest reaches, NASA said. This is the last and most detailed image sent to Earth before the spacecraft's closest approach to Pluto on July 14. The color image has been combined with lower-resolution color information from the Ralph instrument that was acquired earlier on July 13. This view is dominated by the large, bright feature informally named the "heart" which measures approximately 1,000 miles (1,600 kilometers) across. The heart borders darker equatorial terrains, and the mottled terrain to its east (right) are complex. However, even at this resolution, much of the heart's interior appears remarkably featureless - possibly a sign of ongoing geologic processes. (REUTERS/NASA/APL/SwRI/Handout)

The first age of solar system exploration is in the books.

NASA's New Horizons probe flew by Pluto this morning (July 14), capturing history's first up-close looks at the far-flung world — if all went according to plan. (Mission team members won't declare success until they hear from New Horizons tonight.) Closest approach came at 7:49 a.m. EDT (1149 GMT), when the spacecraft whizzed within 7,800 miles (12,500 kilometers) of Pluto's frigid surface. To celebrate, NASA unveiled the latest photo of Pluto, showing a reddish world with a stunning heart-shaped feature on its face.

After today's close encounter, all nine of the solar system's traditionally recognized planets have now been visited by a robotic spacecraft — a massive undertaking begun in 1962 when NASA's Mariner 2 probe zoomed past Venus. More than 1,200 scientists, NASA guests and dignitaries - including 200 reporters - watched the flyby live at New Horizons' mission control center at Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory in Laurel, Md. They chanted a countdown to the closest approach, then cheered and waved American flags as the big moment occurred. [New Horizons' Epic Pluto Flyby: Complete Coverage]

New Horizons is "a capstone mission," Glen Fountain, mission project manager from the Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory in Laurel, Maryland, told Space.com. "It is the completion of this initial reconnaissance of our solar system. It's giving us a new perspective about how we as human beings fit into the universe."

In a coincidence of cosmic proportions, today's close approach fell on the 50th anniversary of the first flyby of Mars, which NASA's Mariner 4 spacecraft executed on July 14, 1965.

"You couldn't have written a script that was better," New Horizons principal investigator Alan Stern, of the Southwest Research Institute in Boulder, Colorado, told Space.com.

There are no longer nine officially recognized planets, of course. The International Astronomical Union famously reclassified Pluto as a "dwarf planet" in 2006, in a decision that remains controversial today.

A long time coming

Pluto was discovered in 1930 by American astronomer Clyde Tombaugh, and the dwarf planet has remained mysterious ever since.

Because Pluto is relatively small and extremely far away — it orbits about 39 times farther from the sun than Earth does, on average — the object is a tough target for instruments on or near Earth. Indeed, the best images by NASA's iconic Hubble Space Telescope show the dwarf planet as merely a blur of pixels.

Astronomers didn't know Pluto had any moons until 1978, when the dwarf planet's big satellite, Charon, was first spotted. At 750 miles (1,200 km) in diameter, Charon is about half as wide as Pluto itself. Furthermore, the two bodies' center of gravity lies outside the dwarf planet, so many researchers regard Pluto-Charon as a binary system.

No additional Pluto moons were detected until 2005. Four tiny satellites — eventually named Nix, Hydra, Kerberos and Styx — were discovered from that year through 2012, all by researchers using Hubble to help prepare for New Horizons' epic flyby. [?Pluto's 5 Moons Explained (Infographic)]

That close encounter has been a long time coming. The $723 million New Horizons mission launched in January 2006 but began taking shape in 1989, the same year NASA's Voyager 2 probe cruised past Neptune, getting the first up-close looks at the stunning, blue "ice giant."

It took more than a decade of hard work and wrangling before New Horizons graduated from concept to full-fledged NASA mission.

"It's an unusually tortured history," said Stern, who has been a driving force behind New Horizons from the very beginning.

New Horizons "faced a crazy number of challenges — politically, funding and priority; nuclear fuel shortages; rocket issues," Stern added. "So many people stuck with this for so long. They got knocked down, they stood up. They got knocked down again, they stood up again. They would not take no for an answer."

All that persistence apparently paid off this morning, when New Horizons hit its target nearly 3 billion miles (4.8 billion km) from Earth, a feat Fountain likened to sinking a hole-in-one on a golf shot from New York City to Los Angeles.

Flyby science

Barring any unfortunate surprises, New Horizons is now studying the Pluto system up close with seven different science instruments, including cameras capable of picking out features on the dwarf planet's surface as small as the ponds in New York City's Central Park.

The spacecraft's observations will help researchers map the surfaces of Pluto and Charon in detail; characterize the two bodies' geology; and shed light on Pluto's wispy, dynamic atmosphere, among other things.

Researchers said they can't wait to get a look at the close-approach data. Their appetites have been whetted by observations gathered over the past few weeks showing that Pluto and Charon are complex worlds with surprisingly diverse surfaces.

For example, Pluto sports a polar ice cap and a huge, bright, heart-shaped feature, as well as a giant dark patch mission scientists have dubbed "the whale." Charon, for its part, is scored by craters and canyons, and harbors an enigmatic, 200-mile-wide (320 km) dark blotch at its north pole.

"The Pluto system is enchanting in its strangeness, its alien beauty," Stern said Tuesday (July 13) during a NASA news conference. "We are already seeing complex and nuanced surfaces that tell us of a history for these two bodies [Pluto and Charon] that is probably beyond our wildest dreams on the science team."

New Horizons is now operating in a nine-day-long "close encounter mode" that runs through Thursday (July 16). But don't expect a big data dump at the end of the week: It will take New Horizons up to 16 months to beam all its observations home. And team members won't even know if the flyby was successful until about 9 p.m. EDT tonight (0100 GMT Wednesday), when the probe's handlers expect to receive a check-in message. (New Horizons can't simultaneously gather observations and send information back to Earth.)

That status update will likely quell a bit of nervousness among the team members, because New Horizons is traveling so fast — 30,800 mph (49,570 km/h) relative to Pluto — that a collision with a piece of debris in the dwarf planet system as small as a grain of rice could be fatal. [New Horizons Wears 'Bulletproof Vest' (Video)]

Analyses suggest that dire outcome is extremely unlikely — but it's possible nonetheless.

"Formally, we're able to set model limits at around 1 in 10,000 [odds] that the spacecraft will be lost due to a debris strike," Stern said during Tuesday's news conference. "But we've also been very honest that we're flying into the unknown. This is the risk you take with all kinds of exploration."

For the ages

The implications of New Horizons' discoveries should extend beyond the Pluto system, mission team members have said. After all, Pluto is just one of thousands of objects — albeit the largest and most famous one — in the Kuiper Belt, the largely unexplored ring of icy bodies beyond Neptune's orbit.

"From the science perspective, we're entering this whole new realm of the solar system," former astronaut John Grunsfeld, associate administrator of NASA's Science Mission Directorate, said during Tuesday's briefing.

New Horizons may get a chance to study a second Kuiper Belt object up close: Mission team members plan to propose a flyby of another, much smaller body if today's close encounter goes well. That second flyby would take place in 2019, assuming NASA gives the green light. (New Horizons' handlers have identified two possible targets for the second flyby, but have not announced which one they would go after.)

Whatever happens with that potential extended mission, New Horizons will leave an impressive legacy, Stern said.

"This is very special," he told Space.com, referring to today's flyby. "I'm a biased guy on this, but I think this'll be the space event of the decade."

Space.com managing editor Tariq Malik contributed to this story from Laurel, Maryland. Follow Mike Wall on Twitter @michaeldwall and Google+. Follow us @Spacedotcom, Facebook or Google+. Originally published on Space.com.
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SpaceNut · 2015-07-14 21:45:30

We have been teasted by the early images and such but in the coming days we will be in awe.....as even more details are made public.

louis · 2015-07-15 04:49:36

SpaceNut wrote:

We have been teasted by the early images and such but in the coming days we will be in awe.....as even more details are made public.

Your comment prompts a reflection:

I am struck by just how much, as with Mars, so with their presentation of their Pluto data, so NASA are completely lacking in focus.

They built up the media ballyhoo over several days for what? well, for a single, solitary photo.

You go to their website, encouraged by news reports, and instead of any live coverage or discussion, you get old background stuff.

For all its technological prowess, NASA seem incapable of communicating well with the public or maintaining focus on what they are doing.

The truth is, if you really want to explore the solar system, then get off this planet and get to Mars. Establish a viable colony on another planet. Everything else will flow from that.

Last edited by louis (2015-07-15 04:50:08)

Tom Kalbfus · 2015-07-15 13:31:50

Some advantages Pluto has over Mars, is it has more water, it has more nitrogen, more oxygen, more methane, in fact it woud probably be hard to get to material that wasn't frozen ices, unless one looks for meteors. Gravity on Pluto is 0.06 G, a person standing on Pluto would weigh a little over one twentieth what he weighs on Earth, this is about one third of what an astronaut would weigh on the Moon. Probably centrifuges would be employed. Pluto would make a great stabilizer for an O'Neil Colony. A 1,000,000 ton structure would weigh 60,000 tons on pluto.
This would probably be what the interior of a Pluto colony would look like:

Notice the artificial sky above with fake clouds, illumination would also be artificial either powered by nuclear fission or fusion.
On the outside, it would look like this:

this one doesn't rely on mirrors for illumination, instead a power plant provides the energy. Perhaps the gravity would be low enough to mount one of these on the planet's surface, perhaps on a mountain top. otherwise it could just orbit the planet and send down shuttles to acquire construction material and fuel for a fusion reactor.

For a surface habitat, you can probably dispense with the radiator panel, as the planet Pluto itself would make a great heat sink!

Last edited by Tom Kalbfus (2015-07-15 13:50:19)

louis · 2015-07-16 06:27:07

It has "more" water...yes - it's just in the wrong place (i.e. another 8.5 years away).

Mars is clearly the place to go. I've nothing against Pluto exploration and its eventual colonisation but we have to learn to walk before we run.

VMCF - Viable Mars colony first.

Tom Kalbfus wrote:

Some advantages Pluto has over Mars, is it has more water, it has more nitrogen, more oxygen, more methane, in fact it woud probably be hard to get to material that wasn't frozen ices, unless one looks for meteors. Gravity on Pluto is 0.06 G, a person standing on Pluto would weigh a little over one twentieth what he weighs on Earth, this is about one third of what an astronaut would weigh on the Moon. Probably centrifuges would be employed. Pluto would make a great stabilizer for an O'Neil Colony. A 1,000,000 ton structure would weigh 60,000 tons on pluto.
This would probably be what the interior of a Pluto colony would look like:
http://i.imgur.com/zeJCDzG.jpg
Notice the artificial sky above with fake clouds, illumination would also be artificial either powered by nuclear fission or fusion.
On the outside, it would look like this:
http://orig07.deviantart.net/3a5a/f/201 … 6knii8.jpg
this one doesn't rely on mirrors for illumination, instead a power plant provides the energy. Perhaps the gravity would be low enough to mount one of these on the planet's surface, perhaps on a mountain top. otherwise it could just orbit the planet and send down shuttles to acquire construction material and fuel for a fusion reactor.
For a surface habitat, you can probably dispense with the radiator panel, as the planet Pluto itself would make a great heat sink!

Tom Kalbfus · 2015-07-16 09:38:09

Remoteness is an advantage if you have a New Cold war. Lets say we send 100 men and women to Pluto at a time of increasing tensions and an increasing number of hostile nations developing nuclear weapons. It takes about 10 years to get to Pluto. If the nations go at each other and destroy civilization on Earth, Pluto is 4 billion miles away. Those nations in their dying agony, can't touch the Pluto colonists, before they destroy each other. Probably a mission to destroy the Pluto Colony won't be high on their priority list when they are fighting for their survival. the Pluto colonists can then wait it out in safety, and then recolonize Earth when the war dies down, of course they'll have millions of fertilized human ova in frozen storage for genetic diversity. Pluto would make a great survivalist shelter. the United States can send a colony out their and let other nations know that if they attack with nuclear weapons, our progeny will eventually return to Earth and recolonize it. How's that for deterrence? The more we spread out, the less vulnerable we'll be to extinction, and Pluto is way out there, the people living there will really be isolated. Also there are probably a lot of other "Plutos" in the Kuiper belt. After you go past a certain distance from the Sun, it does not get much colder that Pluto. With controlled nuclear fusion, we are really not limited to the immediate environment around a star. Pluto also contains some resources that would e useful for terraforming Mars and Venus, lots of voltiles, in fact some of Pluto's smaller Moons can probably be send Sunward Nix for example. Pluto has frozen nitrogen on its surface, Mars could use that. And their are more iceballs further out.

Terraformer · 2015-07-16 15:49:06

Can you imagine that - the descendants of various enemy Earth states battling it out in the black. A colder war indeed.

Of course, that's a lot of resources to waste on fighting other peoples wars, in a region of space where the most abundant resource is ice. They might sabre rattle a little over the radio - "oh look at our shiny new Cruiser" - but it wouldn't make much sense for the Americans on Haumea to fight the Russians on Pluto or the Chinese on Makemake.

SpaceNut · 2015-07-16 18:30:54

The topic is not war so lets end it.....

Now a planets worth of water moved to one that has it locked up making it appear to have none would be of benefit to move as in Nasa's Asteriod mission than a small boulder as its currently proposed....

The again we have other dwarf planets that meet the same criterior of having lots of water that would be a game changer for Mars.....

Tom Kalbfus · 2015-07-17 09:54:43

Its not abut war, its about surviving it, or what ever other catastrophe, runaway nanotechnology and the like. Having too many humans in one spot makes the vulnerable, too many humans, some of them crazy, might get hold of destructive technologies and wipe out the human race. It would be good to have people at Pluto just in case.

SpaceNut · 2015-07-19 18:23:26

New Horizons probe won't be the only spacecraft at our solar system's edge -- it will be joining four other unmanned spacecraft that are already speeding their way out of the solar system: Pioneer 10, Pioneer 11, Voyager 1, and Voyager 2.

http://www.nasa.gov/centers/ames/missio … 10-11.html

http://voyager.jpl.nasa.gov/where/

https://solarsystem.nasa.gov/missions/p … =Voyager_2

Antius · 2015-07-20 12:52:26

Tom Kalbfus wrote:

Its not abut war, its about surviving it, or what ever other catastrophe, runaway nanotechnology and the like. Having too many humans in one spot makes the vulnerable, too many humans, some of them crazy, might get hold of destructive technologies and wipe out the human race. It would be good to have people at Pluto just in case.

At Pluto temperatures, ice would behave as a ceramic. Pluto colonists could use it much as we do concrete here on Earth. Giant pressure domes could be constructed from hexagonal ice blocks and distressed using polypropylene cables. Snow could be used to provide insulation between the warm interior and the cold pressure dome.

Antius · 2015-07-20 12:54:08

Antius wrote:

Tom Kalbfus wrote:
Its not abut war, its about surviving it, or what ever other catastrophe, runaway nanotechnology and the like. Having too many humans in one spot makes the vulnerable, too many humans, some of them crazy, might get hold of destructive technologies and wipe out the human race. It would be good to have people at Pluto just in case.
At Pluto temperatures, ice would behave as a ceramic. Pluto colonists could use it much as we do concrete here on Earth. Giant pressure domes could be constructed from hexagonal ice blocks and distressed using polypropylene cables. Snow could be used to provide insulation between the warm interior and the cold pressure dome.

Sorry I meant pre-stressed. Darn autocorrect.

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Re: New Horizons - mission to Pluto and the Kupier belt

#149 2015-07-20 12:52:26

Re: New Horizons - mission to Pluto and the Kupier belt

#150 2015-07-20 12:54:08

Re: New Horizons - mission to Pluto and the Kupier belt

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