To read the tribute to SFC Marcus Muralles, please click here
Friday, January 20, 2006
Talk About A Road Trip
NASA's New Horizons probe launched yesterday without a hitch, beginning its 3 billion mile (and then some) trip to Pluto.
On site to witness the launch was Patricia Tombaugh, 93. Don't recognize her name? How about her late husband, Clyde Tombaugh? He discovered Pluto back in 1930. Some of his ashes were onboard.
So... mark the calendar for 9+ years from now... that's the next time we'll hear from New Horizons.
The New Horizons spacecraft blasted off aboard an Atlas V rocket Thursday afternoon in a spectacular start to the $700 million mission. Despite the speed - it can reach 36,000 mph - it will take 9 1/2 years to reach Pluto and the frozen, sunless reaches of the solar system. "It looked beautiful," said Ralph McNutt Jr. of the Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory, one of the mission's scientists. "I was getting a little bit antsy." The 1,054-pound spacecraft was loaded with seven instruments that will photograph the surfaces of Pluto and its large moon, Charon, and analyze Pluto's atmosphere. Two of the cameras, Alice and Ralph, are named for the bickering couple from TV's "The Honeymooners."teeheehee... that's cute...
On site to witness the launch was Patricia Tombaugh, 93. Don't recognize her name? How about her late husband, Clyde Tombaugh? He discovered Pluto back in 1930. Some of his ashes were onboard.
"I got emotional. I really did. I just got carried away," said Tombaugh, 93, of Las Cruces, N.M. "It was so beautiful and we've waited so long."I know that a lot of people are against spending money on space research, and there's a part of me that understands it. But, the other part of me is in favor of it... I just wish they'd overhaul NASA. Put me in charge... yeah... I'd fix it good.
So... mark the calendar for 9+ years from now... that's the next time we'll hear from New Horizons.
