PLUTO'S MOON SYSTEM These two images, taken about a week apart by NASA's Hubble Space Telescope, show four moons orbiting the distant, icy dwarf planet Pluto. The green circle in both snapshots marks the newly discovered moon, temporarily dubbed P4, found by Hubble in June. P4 is the smallest moon yet found around Pluto, with an estimated diameter of 8 to 21 miles (13 to 34 km). By comparison, Pluto's largest moon Charon is 648 miles (1,043 km) across. Nix and Hydra are roughly 20 to 70 miles (32 to 113 km) wide. The new moon lies between the orbits of Nix and Hydra, two satellites discovered by Hubble in 2005. It completes an orbit around Pluto roughly every 31 days. The moon was first seen in a photo taken with Hubble's Wide Field Camera 3 on June 28, 2011. The sighting was confirmed in follow-up Hubble observations taken July 3 and July 18. P4, Nix, and Hydra are so small and so faint that scientists combined short and long exposures to create this image of Pluto and its entire moon system. The speckled background is camera "noise" produced during the long exposures. The linear features are imaging artifacts. The tiny satellite was uncovered in a Hubble survey to search for rings around the frigid dwarf planet. The observations will help NASA's New Horizons mission, scheduled to fly through the Pluto system in 2015.
To: SunkenCiv; KevinDavis
2 posted on
07/20/2011 8:14:58 AM PDT by
Red Badger
(PEAS in our time? Obama cries PEAS! PEAS! when there is no PEAS!..........................)
To: Red Badger
8 mile diameter? You could hold a marathon around it.
To: Red Badger
How can this non-planet have a moon, none the less four?!
4 posted on
07/20/2011 8:23:18 AM PDT by
edge10
(Obama lied, babies died!)
To: Red Badger
Doesn’t matter, it’s not a planet remember? Nothing to see here folks, move along, move along.
To: Red Badger
They also discovered another moon around Uranus.
6 posted on
07/20/2011 8:24:32 AM PDT by
dfwgator
To: Red Badger
Anybody remember “The Little Prince” TV show? 8 to 21 miles in diameter isn’t much. Perhaps there’s a little French boy there gardening his rose and tending to the volcanoes?
10 posted on
07/20/2011 8:27:02 AM PDT by
rarestia
(It's time to water the Tree of Liberty.)
To: Red Badger
At least it’s not a spot around Uranus : )
To: All
18 posted on
07/20/2011 8:48:05 AM PDT by
DeoVindiceSicSemperTyrannis
(Want to make $$$? It's easy! Use FR as a platform to pimp your blog for hits!!!)
To: Red Badger
21 posted on
07/20/2011 8:56:15 AM PDT by
Straight Vermonter
(Posting from deep behind the Maple Curtain)
To: Red Badger
To: Red Badger
25 posted on
07/20/2011 9:32:06 AM PDT by
NonValueAdded
(From her lips to the voters' ears: Debbie Wasserman Schultz: "We own the economy" June 15, 2011)
To: Red Badger
Why do other planets get to have multiple moons but we only have one? It isn’t fair! I am for moon redistribution! I must send an urgent letter to Sheila Jackson Lee so she can sponsor a bill. (and watch the hilarity begin)
28 posted on
07/20/2011 10:07:54 AM PDT by
Boiling point
(Cain / Palin 2012)
To: Red Badger
32 posted on
07/20/2011 10:33:43 AM PDT by
lonevoice
(Life is short. Make fun of it.)
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