Wednesday, July 11, 2012

Pluto May Not Be A Planet

But it sure has a mess of moons...


The Hubble space telescope has spied yet another moon orbiting the recently demoted "dwarf planet" Pluto.  P5 (Do they sit up all night coming up with these clever names?) is thought to be 6-15 miles across, irregular in shape, and following a circular orbit 58,000 miles in diameter.  The Hubble is being used to reconnoiter the neighborhood around Pluto in advance of the New Horizon spacecraft's high speed pass in 2015.