Flight of the New Horizons Spacecraft to Pluto and the Kuiper Belt

Paper number

IAC-08.A3.6.14

Author

Dr. Yanping Guo, The John Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory, United States

Year

2008

Abstract

The New Horizons mission is the first space exploration to the Pluto system and the Kuiper Belt. The spacecraft was successfully launched on January 19, 2006, started its decade-long journey across the solar system to reach the outermost planet Pluto in 2015. With seven onboard instruments, New Horizons will conduct a reconnaissance exploration of Pluto, its half-sized moon, Charon, and its two newly discovered moons, Nix and Hydra, for the first time.  After the Pluto encounter, New Horizons will continue to make a close flyby of one or more Kuiper Belt objects before reaching a distance of 50 AU from the Sun.

On the 9th day of the planned 35-day launch period from January 11 to February 14, 2006, and on the third day of the launch attempt that started on January 17, 2006, the New Horizons spacecraft lifted off at 2:00 PM local time on top of the Atlas V rocket from Launch Complex 41 at Cape Canaveral Air Force Station in Florida. About ten minutes into the flight it was inserted into an elliptical Earth parking orbit with perigee altitude at 165 km.  After a short period of coasting in the parking orbit, New Horizons was injected into the heliocentric trajectory toward Jupiter through the Centaur 2nd burn and the third stage of Star 48B firing.  The spacecraft was separated from Star 48B less than 45 minutes after liftoff.  After being injected into the heliocentric orbit, New Horizons reached an Earth departure velocity as high as 16.2 km/s, becoming the fastest spacecraft ever launched from Earth. It passed the Moon eight hours and thirty five minutes after launch.  The launch and orbit injection went extremely well with launch errors under 1-sigma.

Three trajectory correction maneuvers were performed during the cruise from Earth to Jupiter. On February 28, 2007, thirteen months after launch, New Horizons flew by Jupiter and successfully achieved the needed gravity assists and collected enormous science data and images of Jupiter and its moons. The spacecraft is now more than 9 AU away from the Sun and is expected to pass Saturn’s orbit in June 2008. The last trajectory correction maneuver executed in September 2007 has targeted its Pluto arrival date on July 14, 2015.  A review of New Horizons’ past flight trajectory since launch, current position, future trajectory, and the latest design of the Pluto encounter trajectory will be described in this paper.

Abstract document

IAC-08.A3.6.14.pdf

Manuscript document

IAC-08.A3.6.14.pdf (🔒 authorized access only).

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