Pluto probe launch Tuesday night

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ALPiNe
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Post by ALPiNe »

Woohooo! I just feel so happy.. LoL! :lol: :P I caught the whole liftoff live on my screen too! Saw all these 'fireworks' igniting from the ground and witnessed how the New Horizons probe actually went through all the 3 main flight stages before escaping from Earth. Cool! Initially I almost couldn't catch the live streaming as the servers were always either too busy or full..phew... Maybe I should start counting my lucky stars.. :lol:

If I'm not wrong, I think during the second last attempt, just when it was about ~17 seconds to liftoff, NASA decided to delay the launch by another minute! Drats..was staring at my screen and wondering if 17 seconds were that long.

Hmm..I think NASA TV live streaming is having multiple telecasts of the successful launch right now. Maybe those who missed out on the event can take a quick peek at it.

Argh!! I just remembered I have a major test tomorrow and I haven't studied.. Great. :? Alright..got to start mugging and praying real hard.. :cry: Btw, Enjoy the movie! :wink:


Cheers,
:cheers:
- ALPiNe
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Airconvent
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Post by Airconvent »

pluto ...here we come!
let's hope it arrives safely and send back pictures....
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Post by ykchia »

Hi folks:

Not sure how many of you are aware of NH successful launch this morning.... Well normally we dont have much chance of seeing a rocket over our sky. So when Tony from Australia alerted me to NH..- I was excited and wanted to video the passage of rocket dragging a flaming tail..... The first date, I have to asked for singapore prediction but the launch was delay due to bad weather (WX)... then the next day it was delayed again due to a power failures in control room ... and the 3rd time ( this morning).. ... read on.

NH( New Horizons rocket to pluto) - 3rd try - launch 18:06;

1) 15:15 UT ( 11:15pm) - NASA released the trajectory of the 3rd burn. David from Iota emailed me. Singapore was included in the drop-down box of viewing locations. Using SkyAtlas 2000.00 - I started to tag the positions. ( Not too different from first launch prediction). The rocket will move quickly through Southern Cross at eleavation 21 degree and up. Too bad the sky was still cloudy. Will this improve towards early am? Video gears ready... cables checked..... Sony video walkman tested.... Gone to bed but leave the internete connections on...

2) 18:15 UT ( 2:15am) - Alarm Clock Rang. Jumped out of bed and peeped outside the window - sky was still cloudy.

3) 18:40 UT - Checked out Nasa web page - and watching count down - this process 'restarted' at least twice due to 'WX or weather violation' pushing the launch twice to 19:00.

4) 19:00 UT - This time it went through all the tests smoothy - not more last minute 'violations' messages... it was 'exciting' to watch the count down ... T-10, T-9, T-8......T-0 - 'engine fire'... and lift off! .... finally after the first two days delayed.. I felt the goose pimple all over me...

5) 19:10 UT - quick check on updated trajectory... glanced at a couple of coordinates...and verify with skymap on my Palm T3... well not much change. Sky still lousy... no chance to see anything...

6) 19:35 UT - sky did not improved at all - given up hope.. gone back to sleep leaving one video system watching the cloudy sky. Returning to bed, wife stirred - and murmured - 'did you watch the Rocket' 'No, too cloudy' but its on its way ..'.

7) 19:51 UT - I heard my wrist watch alarm went off and 'imagined' that the rocket was sailing pass the Southern Cross...and headed SE - and out of reach from my south- facing window.




rgds
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starfinder
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Re: Pluto probe launch Tuesday night

Post by starfinder »

starfinder wrote:Finally! The New Horizons probe to Pluto has been launched.

I've just watched its lift-off about 10 minutes ago at exactly 3am S'pore time on Fri 20 Jan 2006. There was about a 45 min delay today due to clouds.
After 9 years, New Horizons' long-awaited fly-by of Pluto will soon be happening on (fingers-crossed) 14 July 2015!

I can remember watching its launch almost exactly 9 years ago (see above).

This must be the longest-running event thread on Singastro!

The probe will today be taking optical images for navigation:

New Horizons probe eyes Pluto for historic encounter
http://www.bbc.com/news/science-environment-30954673

Soon we'll know how Pluto clearly looks like.
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Re: Pluto probe launch Tuesday night

Post by Airconvent »

My goodness! If you had a kid then, he will be in P3 this year! It's been that long. On hindsight, it was such a waste to NOT have an orbiter element in the configuratiion. All those years of prep and long journey just for a flyby...
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Re: Pluto probe launch Tuesday night

Post by Hardwarezone »

Airconvent wrote:My goodness! If you had a kid then, he will be in P3 this year! It's been that long. On hindsight, it was such a waste to NOT have an orbiter element in the configuratiion. All those years of prep and long journey just for a flyby...
The probe doesn't have enough fuel for that extreme maneuver.

To bring more fuel, need a bigger rocket , cost and risk goes up.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Delta-v_budget
http://i.imgur.com/WGOy3qT.png
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Re: Pluto probe launch Tuesday night

Post by antares2063 »

Space is really really really vast, a lot of probes use gravity assists (or slingshots) to get to their target...

For example, the Rosetta probe journey to Comet 67P took 12 years-ish

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ktrtvCvZb28

I salute all the maths done to calculate the probe missions ...

Regards,
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Re: Pluto probe launch Tuesday night

Post by ivan »

Strong bump on the post! I was still in Primary school when this was launched. Can't wait to see how pluto looks like!
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Re: Pluto probe launch Tuesday night

Post by Airconvent »

Problem is we still have not figured out a practical way to harness the solar wind against gravity, so that we can travel straight to the object of interest (offset for orbital movement). So our probes are generally travelling in widening orbits using the planets for gravity assist. This takes a long time. I can't wait for them to invent anti-gravity drives or impulse engines...haha They'll be firing up the camera next Sunday and by early Feb, we should have the first (still blurred) image of Pluto... but this time as a disk instead of several pixels.
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Re: Pluto probe launch Tuesday night

Post by Hardwarezone »

ourpluto.org

Pluto and Charon surface feature naming nomination, open to public until 24th April.
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