New Horizons awaits another day

A bit of somewhat depressing news on the science and technology front. The mission to Pluto was scrubbed yesterday due to high winds, but they'll be trying again today.

New Horizons was scheduled to lift off atop a Lockheed Martin Atlas V rocket at 1:24 p.m. ET on Tuesday from the Cape Canaveral Air Force Station in Florida to begin a 10-year, 3-billion-mile mission to Pluto.

Upper-level winds exceeding 33 knots pushed back the launch numerous times. Tuesday's launch window ran from 1:24 p.m. ET to 3:23 p.m. ET. Wednesday's launch window runs from 1:16 p.m. ET to 3:15 p.m. ET. NASA has until February 14 to launch the probe.

This particular mission has been covered extensively on The Science Channel and National Geographic. It won't reach Pluto for more than nine years, but it's still fascinating. New Horizons will be the fastest spaceship ever and, presumably, the fastest man made object in history. It's going to reach speeds in excess of 47,000 miles per hour. When it arrives, we'll have the first and only close up pictures of the planet and its huge moon. Pluto's moon is roughly one half the size of the planet and rather than orbiting Pluto, the two spheres actually rotate around each other with the center of rotation being somewhere in space between them. It's truly more of a binary planet than a planet with a moon.

Even the Hubble hasn't been able to get any clear pictures of Pluto because it's so far away and so small. No matter how jaded we get with modern technology it's still exciting to witness a true "first" in your lifetime.