January 19, 2006

What were you doing on January 19, 2006?

It was a Thursday so I was probably in a high school classroom during my junior year. In 2006, How I Met Your Mother was on its first season.

Well on that January day in 2006, NASA's space probe, New Horizons, was launched to observe Pluto and other Kuiper Belt Objects. And later this morning, New Horizons will have the best view we've seen and flyby Pluto and its five moons at 13.78 km/s (or about 31000 mph). Pluto was even considered a real planet in 2006, not a dwarf planet as it is known as now.

New Horizons' mission is predicted to end in 2026... Talk about a long project... And the mission will even continue past 2026 as long as it's still functioning correctly, but anything past Pluto and its moon is extra special. Can you imagine seeing something progress for over 30 years?