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> could possibly reach magnitude 13 in early 2031 Don't get too excited about looking at this one; that's a bit brighter than Pluto, so you'd need a pretty decent telescope to spot it. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Magnitude_(astronomy)#Examples
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Absolute_magnitude#Cometary_ma...
Earlier quoted context omitted.
No, no need to worry. Coronal mass ejections causing geomagnetic storms are really something to worry about but this thing is just a piece of rock flying around the Sun at very far distances (from our point of view). It is coming no closer than eleven astronomical units to Sun (1 AU is the mean distance of Earth to Sun).
Yeah I totally misunderstood the distances - my bad.
The current distance from Sun is shown in the bottom center and you can change units in the menu attached to it. "Astronomical units" or "light minutes" might be the most useful, kilometers or miles if you just want to be blown away by the order of magnitude.
https://joshworth.com/dev/pixelspace/pixelspace_solarsystem....
I also submitted it for discussion here:
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27573172
Edit: fixed the scale, it's 1px:diameter of Moon, not 1px:distance Earth-Moon as I initially wrote.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
New Horizons took a nearly straight shot to Pluto (just stopping by Jupiter on the way for a gravity assist). That trip took 9 years to travel 40 AU (not at constant speed, of courses, since it's constantly being drawn toward the Sun). This dwarf planet makes its closest approach at 10 AU, so you could do a fly by in less than 3 years if you wanted to pay for it. However, the science return from a flyby would be limi…
Getting into orbit would be rather difficult, as the probe would have have to match the planets velocity at perihelion. My instinct says it’s probably just on the edge of doable (although I’m not sure on which side), but I haven’t crunched the numbers. It would almost certainly need to be launched on a Delta-IV or Falcon Heavy class vehicle. EDIT: s/perigee/perihelion. I could say periapse and be neutral, but perihel…
https://spacenews.com/ulas-delta-4-heavy-down-to-final-five-...
Earlier quoted context omitted.
New Horizons took a nearly straight shot to Pluto (just stopping by Jupiter on the way for a gravity assist). That trip took 9 years to travel 40 AU (not at constant speed, of courses, since it's constantly being drawn toward the Sun). This dwarf planet makes its closest approach at 10 AU, so you could do a fly by in less than 3 years if you wanted to pay for it. However, the science return from a flyby would be limi…
Getting into orbit would be rather difficult, as the probe would have have to match the planets velocity at perihelion. My instinct says it’s probably just on the edge of doable (although I’m not sure on which side), but I haven’t crunched the numbers. It would almost certainly need to be launched on a Delta-IV or Falcon Heavy class vehicle. EDIT: s/perigee/perihelion. I could say periapse and be neutral, but perihel…
Am I right to interpret this as meaning that the body has an extreme inclination, almost in polar orbit of the Sun? That would be pretty interesting; it would mean an orbit completely out of line with the rest of the Solar System.
Is this something we could plan and manage to launch an orbiter/lander to in time? Has anyone thought about the possibility of slapping something like a telescope on that and letting it beam back data and images from veryyyyy far out eventually?
Just launch a deep-space telescope; it would be easier. Soft-landing the telescope on an airless body would be harder (in delta-V terms) than just launching it into an equivalent solar orbit. And the body would block about half your view of the sky at any one time.
Is this something we could plan and manage to launch an orbiter/lander to in time? Has anyone thought about the possibility of slapping something like a telescope on that and letting it beam back data and images from veryyyyy far out eventually?
If you launch your telescope on a spacecraft and get it to match speed with the dwarf planet (which is necessary for a soft landing), there's not much point in actually attaching it to the dwarf planet. That just blocks the view of half the sky. Also, there will be nothing to see out there other than the dwarf planet itself.
Is this something we could plan and manage to launch an orbiter/lander to in time? Has anyone thought about the possibility of slapping something like a telescope on that and letting it beam back data and images from veryyyyy far out eventually?
If you launch your telescope on a spacecraft and get it to match speed with the dwarf planet (which is necessary for a soft landing), there's not much point in actually attaching it to the dwarf planet. That just blocks the view of half the sky. Also, there will be nothing to see out there other than the dwarf planet itself.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Getting into orbit would be rather difficult, as the probe would have have to match the planets velocity at perihelion. My instinct says it’s probably just on the edge of doable (although I’m not sure on which side), but I haven’t crunched the numbers. It would almost certainly need to be launched on a Delta-IV or Falcon Heavy class vehicle. EDIT: s/perigee/perihelion. I could say periapse and be neutral, but perihel…
Might there be not some benefits to try to get into orbit around this object, like perhaps a free ride to the Oort Cloud maybe?
You could get a free ride by having it crash into you, but that's going to be like catching a bus by letting it hit you, at ten thousand miles an hour.