Posted on 07/12/2016 8:03:24 AM PDT by 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.
(Excerpt) Read more at space.com ...
Snicker.
It’s funny how people can get excited about such a small accomplishment as a -00 increment.
Good morning for real! Tom the Son has left for school, and I found a dead rabbit on the way to the trash bin. I suspect Jake.
Good shooting there, TC.
How are we both this morning?
Currently out on a gravel spit in the Solent.
Some overweight king decided to put a castle on the end of it.
The water is on the chilly side this morning,so warming up in the castle cafe.
Is it Hurst Castle? (I used Google!)
There was uncivil unrest in Charlotte overnight (see tagline), but it doesn’t appear to affect the commutes of any of our people. I suggested that Tom the Son leave earlier for school, just in case, but he didn’t.
I trust the national guard have been called out?
Hurst,,,,it sure is.
And a nice sunny day....so far.
What good is the excuse of "traffic delays beyond your control" if you leave early?
Read more about about your problem with invasive foreign crayfish species threatening the extinction of the native white clawed crayfish.
Six different foreign crayfish, some of which are crayfish plague carriers to which the native species is susceptible. Crikey!
Wasn’t aware that the foreign species also threatened erosion of river banks with deep burrowing.
Good capsule summary at:
https://www.buglife.org.uk/crayfish
Didn’t know my innocent question based on gustatory memories would lead down this path.
My guess as to the prohibition on trapping the non-native varieties is to prevent further spread of the plague... one would think that a more sensible action would be to encourage a “catch and eat the tasty foreign buggers” policy.
Nothing about the National Guard, but it was a bad night for the Charlotte-Mecklenburg Police.
Maybe Britain's Fish & Wildlife authorities don't think the public would be able to tell one kind of crayfish from another.
If a mine field needs to exist ,it will find a home in the uk.
“catch and eat the tasty foreign buggers policy.”
We did offer. The gov said no.
Simple solutions to simple problems don’t involve enough civil servants.
“don’t think the public would be able to tell one kind of crayfish from another. “
Think of how many civil servents that education program would require.....
Calling sir Humphrey Appleby .
Excellent point.
We take it where we can find it.
True.
How are you today? We went out for our Mandatory Exercise Excursion, but it started raining.
After that bomb they found in the NJ Transit station was inadvertently detonated we had a lot of people showing up late for work.
“Riiiiiiiight,” I said. “If we’d had a schedule Mayoral visit I’m sure you’d have been here.”
Some people are just looking for an excuse.
DP’s employer sent out email and text notices, telling employees about some streets to avoid this morning.
The correct phrase is "uncivil masters."
I’m wiped. Yesterday turned out to be far more manic than it should have.
We may have just moved our go-live date to October 1 (not sure how to interpret the CIO’s latest status update to the Commissioner). If so, we’ll have a much more thoroughly tested build before we go live. But we may not all have jobs on October 15.
Oh, dear. Best wishes all around!
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