Pluto’s ‘Heart’ Revealed as New Horizons Probe Starts Flyby Campaign: 5 Days Out

Universe Today ^ | July 8, 2015 | Fraser Cain

[lbryce]

The Huge Heart of Pluto
Pluto’s “Heart” is seen in this new image from New Horizons’ Long Range Reconnaissance Imager (LORRI) received on July 8, 2015 after normal science operations resumed following the scary July 4 safe mode anomaly that briefing shut down all science operations. It shows ‘the heart and the whale’ along Pluto’s equator. The LORRI image has been combined with lower-resolution color information from the Ralph instrument. Credits: NASA-JHUAPL-SWRI

Emotions are rising exponentially with the rousing revelation that Pluto has a huge ‘Heart’ as revealed in stunning new imagery received just today (July 8) from NASA’s New Horizons spacecraft – which has also officially started its intensive flyby campaign merely 5 days out from humanity’s history making first encounter with the last unexplored planet in our Solar System on Tuesday, July 14.

Notably, today’s image showing Pluto’s ‘heart-shaped’ surface feature proves that New Horizons is now fully back in business following the nail-biting July 4 weekend anomaly that unexpectedly sent the probe into a protective status known as ‘safe mode’ and simultaneously sent mission engineers and scientists scurrying to their computer screens to resolve the scary issues and recover the probe back to full operation – just in the nick of time.

The intriguing ‘heart’ is the brightest area on Pluto and “may be a region where relatively fresh deposits of frost—perhaps including frozen methane, nitrogen and/or carbon monoxide—form a bright coating,” say mission scientists.

[lbryce]

Okay. No more bytchin' about seeing only drawings and clumps of clay. this picture here is enough to make any space probe proud

[lbryce]

Pluto Pictures Ping List

[Telepathic Intruder]

Maybe we're seeing it upside down, and it's telling us "this is the bleep bleep of the solar system". Maybe a nice place for a robot to visit, but you wouldn't want to live there.

[Dr. Thorne]

[Gefn]

Fascinating,

Oh brave new world that has such wonders in it..

(forgive me Shakespeare for taking liberties with your words- it just fits this somehow)

[cripplecreek]

I think the thing that concerns me most is all the maneuvering the spacecraft has to do during its pass.

Its going in a straight line but will be doing a lot of flipping, spinning, and rotating to aim different instruments at the planet and then returning to orient its radio dish back toward earth.

[SkyDancer]

So what we’ll see is these fuzzy images?

[Army Air Corps]

Not bad for being a few million miles away. The images will improve as the probe closes-in on Pluto.

[lurk]

Pics taken by a mom who doesn’t know how to focus the camera.

[dadfly]

amazing. God glorifying.

[Slings and Arrows]

I love you too, Pluto!

[lbryce]

I like God-Glorifying better.