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EXPANDING SUNSPOT: Fast-growing sunspot 848 has doubled in size since yesterday (movie), but it does not yet pose a threat for strong flares. Solar activity remains low.
ROCKET TO PLUTO: Thirty-five years ago, Apollo astronauts took 3 days to reach the moon. Yesterday, New Horizons did it in 9 hours, becoming the fastest spacecraft ever launched from Earth. New Horizons needs all the speed it can get: destination Pluto is nearly 3 billion miles away. (continued below)
The launch of New Horizons, photographed by Jonathan Squire of De Land, Florida. Jan. 19, 2006.
After zipping past the moon's orbit, New Horizons heads for Jupiter, a 13 month trip. The spacecraft will slingshot around the giant planet, boosting its speed even more, from 36,000 mph to 47,000 mph.
All that speed, and it will still take New Horizons 9 years to reach Pluto. What will it find when it gets there? No one knows, because no spacecraft has ever visited Pluto. Stay tuned for updates ... in 2015.
UPSIDE-DOWN RAINBOW: On Jan. 15th, Jerry Kinnamon looked up and saw a brilliant "upside-down rainbow" over Zephyrhills, Florida. "Every camera started snapping," says Kinnamon. "People were staring and pointing."
In fact, this strange rainbow is not a rainbow at all. It's a circumzenithal arc. While rainbows are formed by raindrops falling to Earth, circumzenithal arcs are formed by ice crystals floating in high clouds.
"The circumzenithal arc is the most beautiful of all ice halos," says atmospheric optics expert Les Cowley. "Look for them overhead when the sun is fairly low --especially if sundogs are visible."