New Horizons: Pluto and Beyond

[Bozo Erectus]

Lift off at 11am Eastern

New Horizons is in the final stages of preparation before blasting off on its voyage to Pluto, during which it will become the fastest spacecraft ever to depart Earth.

NASA is counting down to a lift-off at 1324 EST (1824 GMT) on Tuesday, with the craft sitting atop an Atlas 5 rocket at Cape Canaveral Air Force Station, Florida, US.

The Atlas 5, one of the cape's largest rockets, will have five solid rocket motors strapped to its side, one of which had to be replaced after being damaged by Hurricane Wilma.

The 478-kilogram spacecraft will experience five times the force of Earth's gravity during its climb into space. It will reach the Moon in nine hours – the Apollo capsules took three days.

In one year the probe will slingshot around Jupiter, using the gas giant's gravity to boost its speed yet further, and one month after that it will go into hibernation mode for the rest of its journey. As it leaves Jupiter behind, it will be flying at 21 kilometres (13 miles) per second.

http://www.newscientistspace.com/article.ns?id=dn8587

Hope Im still around in 2015 when it reaches Pluto, but for me, the big story is that the moon is now only 9 hours away.

 

[IglooDame]

Lift off at 11am Eastern

http://www.newscientistspace.com/article.ns?id=dn8587

Hope Im still around in 2015 when it reaches Pluto, but for me, the big story is that the moon is now only 9 hours away.

A little like traveling by commercial airlines now - the planes are pretty fast, but most of the travel time is taken getting to the airport, sitting/standing in the airport, or sitting on the tarmac awaiting clearance for takeoff.

But anyway, yeah - 5G's isn't excessive for healthy adults, and 9 hours isn't bad at all. Can any of the rocket scientists around here compute what the Mars trip would optimally be at those speeds/accelerations?

 

[skadistic]

Lift off at 11am Eastern

http://www.newscientistspace.com/article.ns?id=dn8587

Hope Im still around in 2015 when it reaches Pluto, but for me, the big story is that the moon is now only 9 hours away.

Can you say weekend trip to the moon? Ten years isn't to far away. But why send a probe to Pluto? Cant we just aim Hubble at it and take some photos? While it is cool I could thnk of better places to spend the money in space exploration like cooler plants such as Saturn.

 

[thetrooper]

Ugh - forget that.

 

[Bozo Erectus]

If Jupiter is one year away, Id guess Mars would take under 6 months. If the moon is only 9 hours away, its a crime not to put a permanent scientific outpost there.

 

[Bozo Erectus]

Can you say weekend trip to the moon? Ten years isn't to far away. But why send a probe to Pluto? Cant we just aim Hubble at it and take some photos? While it is cool I could thnk of better places to spend the money in space exploration like cooler plants such as Saturn.

Pluto is only the first part of the mission, after that its heading into the mysterious Kuiper Belt, where we've lately been discovering large bodies. Xena (one of the recently discovered objects), is actually bigger than Pluto, and has its own moon 'Gabrielle'.

 

[betazed]

If Jupiter is one year away, Id guess Mars would take under 6 months. If the moon is only 9 hours away, its a crime not to put a permanent scientific outpost there.

Hate to break it to you the moon is not 9 hours away.

The Pluto probe will basically zip past it accelerating most of the way so it can make it to moon in 9 hours.

For a human travel the fastest would be to accelerate half the way at maximum acceleration then slow down the next half at maximum decceleration and then go into orbit around the moon, which will require at least one orbit of travel around the moon.

I doubt it can be done in less than a few days.

 

[Abaddon]

As it leaves Jupiter behind, it will be flying at 21 kilometres (13 miles) per second.

FFFFFfffffZZZzzzzooooooommmmmmmmmm....!

Bloody hell thats fast. Certainly a blink and you will miss it! Imagine what kinda strenght that rocket needs to have not to fall appart.

 

[Hundegesicht]

If Jupiter is one year away, Id guess Mars would take under 6 months. If the moon is only 9 hours away, its a crime not to put a permanent scientific outpost there.

The moon has no atmosphere, meaning you can't just use air friction to slow the decent to the surface like we do with shuttles here on Earth. Unless you want your astronaughts crashing into the surface of the moon at 13 miles a second, you'd have to have enough fuel to deccelerate to a low enough speed to make a landing.

Being able to deccelerate after the rocket is launched would require more fuel, which in turn means more mass, which would make it so the rocket needs much more energy to reach the same speeds. The Pluto rocket in question was built entirely for the purpose of reaching a very high volocity, but is, in fact, incapable of slowing itself down. (Not that it needs to)

 

[Bozo Erectus]

Hate to break it to you the moon is not 9 hours away.

The Pluto probe will basically zip past it accelerating most of the way so it can make it to moon in 9 hours.

For a human travel the fastest would be to accelerate half the way at maximum acceleration then slow down the next half at maximum decceleration and then go into orbit around the moon, which will require at least one orbit of travel around the moon.

I doubt it can be done in less than a few days.

Huh? The article says it'll take 9 hours to reach the moon. How is 9 hours not really 9 hours?

@Hundegesicht, ah ok I think I blunderstand.

 

[Hundegesicht]

FFFFFfffffZZZzzzzooooooommmmmmmmmm....!

Bloody hell thats fast. Certainly a blink and you will miss it! Imagine what kinda strenght that rocket needs to have not to fall appart.

In outer space? None, really. I'm currently travelling much faster than that...

 

[El_Machinae]

The article says it'll take 9 hours to reach the moon.

But, if we ever need to bomb lunarians, then we're golden.

I'd like to remind everyone that there's an asteroid that comes within four lunar distances of Earth. If we could nudge it a bit, we could set it into orbit of Earth, which would make building an orbit base/factory MUCH easier.

 

[Hundegesicht]

@Hundegesicht, ah ok I think I blunderstand.

Betazed could probably prove it mathematically, if you want. Something to do with the acceleration of gravity times the mass of the vessel taking into account the friction caused by air in Florida and the potential energy output and efficiency of the fuel being burnt by the rockets in question, to the power of the number of molecules in Leonard Nimoy's butt during the Star Trek convention in 1993.

Sadly, my understanding of physics ends where the math begins.

 

[Aphex_Twin]

Nevermind...

 

[dragokatzov]

Hate to break it to you the moon is not 9 hours away.

yes, it is, with the net rocket NASA is using

 

[El_Machinae]

A sustained 5G acceleration can take you to Mars in one month.

That seems long. You mean with acceleration and decel, right? Even then, it seems wrong. I thought it would be much shorter than that, with constant accel.

 

[betazed]

Huh? The article says it'll take 9 hours to reach the moon. How is 9 hours not really 9 hours?

The article is correct. New Horizons will reach moon in 9 hours. But it will not stop at moon. It will zip by it.

But if you want to go to moon you want not only reach it you want to stop at the moon. That means you cannot accelerate all the way. You have to speed up and then slow down (something that new horizons does not have to do). Also you cannot speed up (or slow down) as fast as you want since humans can only take so many g's for a sustained period of time. So you cannot make it to moon in 9 hours although New Horizons can.

I guess I should have clearer in my post.

@dragokatzov: Which rocket do you have in mind?

 

[Aphex_Twin]

That seems long. You mean with acceleration and decel, right? Even then, it seems wrong. I thought it would be much shorter than that, with constant accel.

You're right. It should be ~ 14 hours with constant accel.
(mixed up minutes with hours)

 

[El_Machinae]

So, how long would the trip take at a more leisurely .5 g acceleration?

 

[betazed]

The moon has no atmosphere, meaning you can't just use air friction to slow the decent to the surface like we do with shuttles here on Earth. Unless you want your astronaughts crashing into the surface of the moon at 13 miles a second, you'd have to have enough fuel to deccelerate to a low enough speed to make a landing.

Well, technically speaking you won't need to land the main craft (or slow it down to landing speeds). You just need it to slow down sufficiently and "miss" the moon at a proper angle so that it goes into an orbit (just like all teh Apollo missions did).