Astronomy Picture of the Day - Pluto at Night

APOD.NASA.gov ^ | 26 Mar, 2022 | Image Credit: NASA, Johns Hopkins Univ./APL, Southwest Research Institute

[MtnClimber]

Explanation: The night side of Pluto spans this shadowy scene. In the stunning spacebased perspective the Sun is 4.9 billion kilometers (almost 4.5 light-hours) behind the dim and distant world. It was captured by far flung New Horizons in July of 2015 when the spacecraft was at a range of some 21,000 kilometers from Pluto, about 19 minutes after its closest approach. A denizen of the Kuiper Belt in dramatic silhouette, the image also reveals Pluto's tenuous, surprisingly complex layers of hazy atmosphere. Near the top of the frame the crescent twilight landscape includes southern areas of nitrogen ice plains now formally known as Sputnik Planitia and rugged mountains of water-ice in the Norgay Montes.

[MtnClimber]

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For more detail go to the link and click on the image for a high definition image. You can then move the magnifying glass cursor then click to zoom in and click again to zoom out. When zoomed in you can scan by moving the side bars on the bottom and right side of the image.

[MtnClimber]

[MtnClimber]

Pinging the APOD list.

🪐 🌟 🌌 🍔

[DannyTN]

Pluto Demoted day is Aug 24th.

Now it's a Dwarf planet.

Little people planet?
Midget Planet?
Growth impaired planet?
Planet of short stature

[maddog55]

I was standing on the deck last night Pluto looked much darker than usual... Then again my eyes aren’t as good as they used to be 🥸

[fhayek]

When the light is right
From Mars, I see the stars
On Pluto, at night
Like on Venus, I hold my penis
and hope to probe Uranus...

[BenLurkin]

bttt

[telescope115]

We waited for years for New Horizons to reach Pluto, and just like THAT, it was gone. It was an amazing journey.

[Big Red Badger]

Jupiter and Saturn
Conjunction,
December 21,2020.
.
The beginning of troubles.
.
Any Biblical Star Gazers
Have celestial happenings
For the near Future?

[minnesota_bound]

Pluto at night

[FatherofFive]

Little people planet? Midget Planet? Growth impaired planet? Planet of short stature

It is a planette.

[DannyTN]

That would make a great Broadway dance chorus.

Planettes with legs able to high kick.

[DannyTN]

Nice!