Launched in 2006, NASA’s New Horizons mission has been voyaging through the far reaches of our solar system. In that time New Horizons has travelled nearly 2.9 billion miles, slipping in and out of prescribed hibernations to limit wear on its electronics. In fact, since mid-2007 the Agency’s vessel has cycled through 18 hibernation periods some lasting as many as 202 days.
While these van-Winkle-esque feats have been critical to the missions success NASA is now on the cusp of reviving New Horizons for good. On December 6, commands that have already been uploaded to the craft will wake its critical systems and Horizons will transmit an “active” signal to Earth. Given its distance from its home world the craft’s short utterance will take 4 hours and 25 minutes to reach Earth.
After initial contact has been established NASA’s engineers will run through a list of housekeeping measures and re-build and test New Horizons final flight sequences.
Equipped with seven scientific instruments (including advanced imaging infrared and ultraviolet spectrometers, a compact multicolor camera, a high-res telescopic camera, two particle spectrometers, a space-dust detector and two radio-science experiments) New Horizons main objective is to examine Pluto’s atmospheric composition and map the geology and topography of the former planet. While in the neighborhood New Horizons will also investigate Pluto’s largest moon Charon and search for other smaller satellites.
After its fly-by of Pluto New Horizon will set off for even deeper space looking to encounter and study a few Kuiper Belt Objects sometime in between 2016 and 2020. If the mission’s batteries hold out until 2038 New Horizon’s will also begin transmitting data to a new generation of NASA scientists, this time it’ll be describing the nature of the very edge of our solar system, the outer heliosphere.
Image Courtesy of NASA