“It’s clear to me that the solar system saved the best for last! We could not have explored a more fascinating or scientifically important planet at the edge of our solar system. In the five years since that groundbreaking flyby, nearly every conjecture about Pluto possibly being an inert ball of ice has been thrown out the window or flipped on its head. The encounter - which also included a detailed look at the largest of Pluto’s five moons, Charon - capped the initial reconnaissance of the planets started by NASA’s Mariner 2 mission more than 50 years before, and revealed an icy world replete in magnificent landscapes and geology - towering mountains, giant ice sheets, pits, scarps, valleys and terrains seen nowhere else in the solar system. For the first time ever, we saw the surface of this distant world in spectacular, colored detail. After a voyage of nearly 10 years and more than 3 billion miles, the intrepid piano-sized probe flew within 7,800 miles of Pluto. Five years ago today, NASA’s New Horizons spacecraft made history.
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