Nasa's New Horizons: 'Snowman' shape of distant Ultima Thule
Jan 5, 2019 11:03:06 GMT
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Post by magicmuggle01 on Jan 5, 2019 11:03:06 GMT
The "snowman" completes a full rotation every 15 hours.
Image from BBC site.
The small, icy world known as Ultima Thule has finally been revealed.
A new picture returned from Nasa's New Horizons spacecraft shows it to be two objects joined together - to give a look like a "snowman".
The US probe's images acquired as it approached Ultima hinted at the possibility of a double body, but the first detailed picture from Tuesday's close flyby confirms it.
New Horizons encountered Ultima 6.5 billion km from Earth.
The event set a record for the most distant ever exploration of a Solar System object. The previous mark was also set by New Horizons when it flew past the dwarf planet Pluto in 2015.
But Ultima is 1.5 billion km further out.
Read:- www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-46742298
