Alan Stern
Alan Stern
Sol Alan Sternis an American engineer and planetary scientist. He is the principal investigator of the New Horizons mission to Pluto and the Chief Scientist at Moon Express...
arrival certain date july quite
I have July 14, 2015, emblazoned on my calendar. That's our arrival date at Pluto. We are now quite certain of that.
approach spacecraft testing walk
It's really going spectacularly well. The whole approach to testing a spacecraft is to walk before you run.
billion bit conditions giant observe outer provides rewriting textbooks time window
It provides for us a window 41/2 billion years back in time to observe the formation conditions of giant planets. This is a little bit about rewriting the textbooks about the outer planets.
built environment fly good job learn
It's now our job to be good stewards of the spacecraft. and to learn to fly it in the real environment that it was built for.
above absolute arriving candy covered degrees exotic kids surface system
Its surface is only 40 degrees above absolute zero, covered with exotic ice. We think it's going to be like kids in a candy store, arriving in a system like this.
exciting outer realizing solar textbooks
We're realizing just how much there is to the deep, outer solar system. I think it's exciting that textbooks have to be rewritten, over and over.
moon nine months
It'll be the fastest spacecraft ever to Jupiter...13 months after launch. We pass the Moon in just nine hours.
halloween moon pluto
It's strictly coincidental that Pluto of course was named for the god of the underworld and we're describing these Halloween moons
opportunity space people
Naming celestial objects is usually done by astronomers and professionals. Other people who are interested in space never get the opportunity to do that kind of thing.
science dwarves everyday
We're just learning that a lot of planets are small planets, and we didn't know that before, fact is, in planetary science, objects such as Pluto and the other dwarf planets in the Kuiper Belt are considered planets and called planets in everyday discourse in scientific meetings.
real moon horizon
This is in a real sense the capstone of the initial missions to explore the planets. Pluto, its moons and this part of the solar system are such mysteries that New Horizons will rewrite all of the textbooks.
class earth pluto
It used to be said that Pluto is a misfit. But now we know Earth is the misfit. This is the most populous class of planet in our solar system and we have never sent a mission to this class.
candy kids
We'll be like kids in a candy shop.
criteria moon object objects small solar system whether
Whether or not an object has a moon is not part of the criteria that we've considered, because so many small objects in the solar system have moons,