New Dwarf Planet Discovered Far Beyond Pluto's Orbit

space.com ^ | 07/11/2016

[BenLurkin]

Pluto isn't quite as lonely as scientists had thought.

Astronomers have discovered another dwarf planet in the Kuiper Belt, the ring of icy objects beyond Neptune. But this newfound world, dubbed 2015 RR245, is much more distant than Pluto, orbiting the sun once every 700 Earth years, scientists said. (Pluto completes one lap around the sun every 248 Earth years.)

"The icy worlds beyond Neptune trace how the giant planets formed and then moved out from the sun," discovery team member Michele Bannister, of the University of Victoria in British Columbia, said in a statement. "They let us piece together the history of our solar system."

...

The exact size of 2015 RR245 is not yet known, but the researchers think it's about 435 miles (700 kilometers) wide. Pluto is the largest resident of the Kuiper Belt, with a diameter of 1,474 miles (2,371 km).

The research team first spotted 2015 RR245 in February of this year, while poring over images that the Canada-France-Hawaii Telescope in Hawaii took in September 2015 as part of the ongoing Outer Solar System Origins Survey (OSSOS).

"There it was on the screen — this dot of light moving so slowly that it had to be at least twice as far as Neptune from the sun," Bannister said.

[Covenantor]

I see it....mint chocolate chip ice cream eyes.

[Monkey Face]

Yes ma’am! :o]

[Covenantor]

You digging....what’s the Eagle Scout candidate doing?

[Covenantor]

Yes ma’am? Misplaced your glasses?

;>)

[Tax-chick]

He’s going to be directing the assembly of the potting shed, which requires the young men with some height and skills. Women and smaller boys will be manning ... er, girling and boying ... the shovel brigade.

It’s for the garden at a day center for people with Alzheimer’s Disease.

[Monkey Face]

Sorry...I’m up in the night...I have to leave for the lab.
Again, I’m sorry...:o[ *blush*

[Covenantor]

Ahhh...good deeds and excercise...good works for the day.

For run of the mill scouting after learning knots and lashings, the pioneering project was a 20ft high watch tower at the church camp, just three of us. Heck of a lot of fun and satisfaction. Lasted quite a long time before bolted construction replaced it.

[Covenantor]

LOL’d at that. Best wishes for your test results. Be careful ‘face.

[null and void]

It’s all about how much air you keep in your lungs.

Or in my case, fat floats...

[Covenantor]

Face, tracked down one of the tech support guys you were dealing with.

A clear case of Eat TFM...what a team!

[Covenantor]

Face, tracked down one of the tech support guys you were dealing with.

A clear case of Eat TFM...what a team!

[Covenantor]

[null and void]

even though the move is only 120 miles. I don’t want to have to replace anything.

Moving to Area 51?

[NicknamedBob]

Thanks for the directions. That will be very helpful.

Around here, folks seem to like giving directions by what used to be there. Applied to the solar system, what used to be here was a plethora of first-generation stars that all went supernova.

[Monkey Face]

Ummm...no. The other direction — St George, UT. Through the Slot Canyon and out the other side.

[Monkey Face]

It was just a routine blood test. I took Boulder Highway in, then Flamingo, and the latter is being reconstructed. GAH! So I took the I-95 home to avoid the traffic cones and lumps in the road.

[Tax-chick]

Sally and I are back from Eagling, and the first load of wash is one. Hopefully it will be in the dryer before DP and the t’ree boys come back. I needed to be here with Frank and Kathleen so Bill can go to work, also there wasn’t much left that needed me.

The adult men decided, after about a half hour of shoveling, that it wasn’t much fun, so they took up a collection and rented a power-trencher.

[Tax-chick]

That’s a small Asian boy sitting on a goat. You don’t see that every day.

[Covenantor]

Fun? Ain’t supposed to be fun. That’s why it’s called work.

If you’d told them there was a civil war musket in there, that trench dirt would have been flying all over the place. Tom Sawyer was the master in such matters.

;>)

[Tax-chick]

Heh, good point. According to a sign at the nearby shopping center, the area used to be a plantation owned by an ancestor of Elvis Presley. However, we didn’t find anything except rocks, and bricks of the kind used to build the center.

I kicked in for the trencher, since it was decided.