Conditions on Pluto: Incredibly hazy with flowing ice; new photos released
Images from New Horizons’ Long Range Reconnaissance Imager (LORRI) were combined with color data from the Ralph instrument to create this enhanced color global view of Pluto. (Image: NASA/JHUAPL/SwRI)
CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. (AP) — Pluto is hazier than scientists expected and appears to be covered with flowing ice.
The team responsible for the New Horizons flyby of Pluto last week released new pictures Friday of the previously unexplored world.
Scientists say layers of haze stretch 100 miles into the atmosphere, much higher than anticipated. All this haze is believed to account for Pluto's reddish color.
As for the incredible ice flows, they appear to be relatively recent: just a few tens of millions of years. Temperatures are minus 380 degrees Fahrenheit, and so water ice would not move anywhere in such extreme cold.
But scientists say the nitrogen and other ices believed to be on Pluto would be geologically soft and therefore able to flow like glaciers on Earth.