Universe Today
After almost nine years on the road, New Horizons is in what NASA calls “Pluto-space”! Earlier today (July 7), the spacecraft Twitter account announced New Horizons is now 29.8 Earth-sun distances (astronomical units) away from the Sun, putting it within the boundaries of Pluto’s eccentric orbit — exciting, since Pluto is the primary science target.
The supermassive black hole is 40 million times as massive as the sun and powers a quasar that existed 700 million years after the Big Bang.
The asteroid zoomed by Earth at a perfectly safe distance of around 1.8 million miles (2.9 kilometers).
Images show surprise changes to the spacecraft as it interacted with the atmosphere.
