Why do they love Pluto so much

“Graduation at the Nerds” - so on social networks they jokingly called what was happening in the USA and throughout the nearby world on Tuesday and Wednesday. On July 14, the American probe Horizons probe flew past Pluto and his satellites as notes and handed them over the first photographs in the history of close -up. Along the way, New Horizons has collected data that will pump to the Earth for the next 16 months and of which scientific articles will make at least five more years.

These few moments - the probe at the time of maximum rapprochement moved at a speed of 14 kilometers of a second - became not only an hour of X in the mission that started already in 2006, but also, probably, at least this decade in astronomy. Neil Degrass Tyson, known for the astronomer and a popularizer of science, compared the task of New Horizons with sending a golf ball exactly to the hole from a distance of two miles - in this case, the ball, however, cost $ 700 million.

It seemed that it was impossible to even get closer to the completely Hollywood landing of the Curiosity Marshound, which was shown at Times Square, but the New Horizons did it. According to the American publication Quartz , the famous heart photo on Instagram NASA already scored more than 100 thousand likes in the first few minutes, and a session of questions-answers (AMA, ASK Me ANYTHING) instantly flew to the main page of the resource. “If in the morning you were online on Tuesday on Tuesday, you saw that there was a pluto in all the fields.”

See how NASA began a broadcast from the place where they followed the probe: if you don’t know what it is about, you can decide that this is about the presentation of a new iPhone. The Wait is Over , there is a historical moment, which we all have been waiting for so long. And although it has been written about nine years, this space saga about American superiority began much earlier.

If you do not know what it is about, you can decide that this is about the presentation of a new iPhone.

Autumn 1932. Professor of the University of Illinois Robert Baker, the author of superpopular books on astronomy and, in particular, the editor of the fresh “astronomy for all”, for no reason begins to receive angry letters from Kansas. Very dissatisfied Kansa farmers believe that the professor showed extreme disrespect, without mentioning their comrade and fellow countryman in the book. Farmers have already reached the publishing house and attracted not only local newspapers, but also New York Times , where I read about this story 83 years later.

Comrade's name is Clyde Tombo, he is 26 years old, he is shy about all this venture, and he opened Pluto.

In the joint story of Tombo and Pluto, in fact, it is so beautiful and movie absolutely everything. Of course, we are generally inclined to dramatize and heroize when it comes to great scientific discoveries - but Pluto is really created in order to talk about him excitedly.

The first strip of New York Times the day after the opening, March 14, 1930, reported: astronomers believe that a new planet of four billion miles from the Earth can be larger than Jupiter and at least no less than the Earth. The announcement of the ninth planet of the Solar System was carefully timed to the anniversary of the birth of Persival Lowella, a businessman, an astronomer, Tony Stark at the beginning of the 20th century, who founded the observatory in Arizona and published work in 1915 with the prediction of the existence of the planet next after the Neptune.

Actually, Pluto all this time was right before the eyes of scientists: shortly after his official opening, the Mount-Uilson Observatory, where there was the largest ground telescope in the world then, found 1919 photos, in which Pluto successfully remained unnoticed by the next 11 years. Moreover, the Lowell Observatory itself actually photographed what they would then be called Pluto, back in 1915, more than a year before the death of its founder.

Chairman of the Board of Trustees of the Observatory Roger Lowell-Putnam, the nephew of Persival Lowella, in the same article by NYT states that the discoverer of the ninth planet can be safely considered the Vesto Slifer, the director of the observatory and the head of the project of the search for the Lawelov Planet X. The slice, at that time already known to the astronomer, by the way, took Tombo to work-as the newspapers later wrote, not least because of the financial difficulties of the observatory: after all, a guy with one class of high school could be paid little.

Transneptunal heroes-the eccentric millionaire Lowell, a guy from the people of Tombo, who, according to the book, makes his first telescope for $ 36, and 11-year-old Venice Bernie, who proposed to name Pluto Pluto, and asked for the poster of the Hollywood film.

The historian of science from the Habertford College in Pennsylvania Darin Hayton writes that at first the role of Persival Lowell and, to a slightly lesser extent, the observatory researchers in the opening of Pluto in scientific publications were intensively overstated, and the role of Assistant-photographer Tombo-on the contrary, was undermined. Moreover, Tombo himself, apparently, was then inclined to consider himself only an executor who did not deserve recognition as the discoverer of the planet. “I'm just lucky, that's all,” he said to Associated Press . I, I see, are not a real astronomer.

Hayton says such a placement of priorities was quite tenacious. But the more it became known about Pluto, the clearer it was that he could not be the planet that Lowell predicted. Finally, this issue was resolved only with the discovery of Haron, the largest companion of the planet, in 1978: with its help, the astronomers appreciated the mass of Pluto, and it became clear that if Lowell predicted something, then not him. It turned out that this is just such a successful coincidence, multiplied by talent and diligent work of the 24-year-old Tombo.

True, newspapers immediately fell in love with a self-mead-astronomer from Kansas: Clyde Tombo, like no other, approached the role of the first American who opened the planet. About six months after the opening of Pluto, the guy went on vacation on the ranch of his parents-space with space, and the crop will not remove himself.

Transneptunal heroes-eccentric Lowell, Tombo, who, according to the book, himself makes his first telescope for $ 36, 11-year-old Venice Bernie, who proposed to name Pluto Pluto (and her cousin called Mars Fobos and Damos), and ask for the poster of the Hollywood film. These are new heroes and the new age of astronomy in one sentence. Now, in order to open the planet, it is not necessary to be an astronomer in a white wig that names it in honor of the king (William Herschel and Uranus). Or a French mathematician and a German astronomer, exchanging strict letters and speaking at the National Academy of Sciences (Urben Lever, Johann Galle, Neptune). You can be the son of poor farmers from the town of Berdett, Kansas.

(Hershel, Lever, and Galle - and Tombo too - in this place is reported by hello fifteen -year -old boy Tom Wagg, who opened the exoplanet in practice at the British University .)

The place in Kansas, by the way, exists today: this is a settlement of “about 300 people, including cats and dogs - people here are friendly and glad to see you!” -It is said on the site of this, in general, villages. In the “History” section, Clyde Tombo is mentioned, as it were, by the way-literally between the records “1929, the first brown-groove cemetery named Gai Newport worked for only two weeks” and “1931, the Braun-Groove planted evergreen trees”. It was written about Tombo that he studied at a local school, was engaged in astronomy among currant bushes on a family farm, then he went to the Lawella observatory in Arizona and opened Pluto in 1930.

The next proposal looks like this: “However, in 2006, the organization of professional astronomers decided that the little Pluto is not a first -class planet. Now it is considered a planet of the second class, that is, a dwarf planet. ” You read and think: it is unlikely that the friendly 300 people, cats and dogs of Berdett, Kansas, are happy to see the International Astronomical Union.

Pluto is also a kind of visual retelling of the research of the solar system in one heavenly body. It was open from the ground as a dust in the photo, somehow removed by the revolutionary Hubble (the “most clear picture of Pluto in history” as of 1990 looked like this ) and finally photographed near the spacecraft as a result of the operation, from the scale and adrenaline of which any “mission of non-scope” smokes on the sidelines, even the one where Tom Cruise actually hangs on the door of the flying. aircraft. Obviously, the next act is the landing module: the scientific director of the New Horizons Alan Stern Half -Jushed admitted that he was already secretly developing.

For a second, I am not surprised by the fact that the signal of the standard work of the probe reached the land in just 8 minutes and 20 seconds to the exact fifty anniversary of the first successful span past the planet: Mariner 4 in 1965 transmitted the first photos of Mars from the orbit. (I say, this is an ideal story.) The circle is closed, the “family portrait” of the canonical solar system is completed, only new horizons are ahead.

Animation "Pluto in time"
© NASA

As in any story, there is morality here. It is convenient that for me, in fact, Elis Bownean, a heroic woman, is a New Horizons flight manager. At her press conference, completely exhausted after a day of nervous expectation, they asked: what do you feel now? “It is impossible to describe in the words what it feels like to fulfill your childhood dream about the study of space. Tell your children to do what they love. Do what you want to do. Change this challenge for yourself, ”Bownean said. Clyde Tombo and parents Claid Tombo, immensely proud of his son, approve.

As in any story, there is a second bottom. The same press conference was the head of NASA Charlie Bolden, who solemnly said that the United States has now become the only nation on the planet that visited the "all the planets of the solar system." So far, the whole twitter argued whether this is that the head of NASA was also dissatisfied with the unclenching of Pluto, Emily Lakdavall, an employee of Planetary Society (a large public organization lobbying space research) and a well -known blogger, irritably wrote that she fundamentally refuses to applaud this statement.

According to Emily, such statements represent the situation as if we had already studied all in the solar system, although this is not true at all. The “classmates” of Pluto, the dwarf planets of Erid, Sedna, Haumaa and Mcymak, the satellites of Jupiter and Saturn, the uranium, in the end (we were the last time we saw him near in 1986 - and also in passing), comets, asteroids - all this is still waiting in the wings. Yes, we advanced well, but not the time to scream “Bingo!”, Closing nine squares in the row. Time to move on to the tasks with an asterisk.

About six months after the opening of Pluto, the 26-year-old Clyde Tombo went on vacation to the ranch of his parents-space with space, and the crop will not remove itself.

As in any story, there is a third bottom. Pluto turned out to be extremely photogenic: well, of course, he has a heart! (The ideal story.) And, of course, social networks could not but be filled with cute pictures with signatures like “Darling Earth, thanks for visiting. With love, Pluto ”and comics about the broken heart of the lonely celestial body, past which the probe flew so rapidly. And he didn’t even slow down.

Loneliness and heavy share of Pluto are not a new topic: when in the late 1980s, scientists already argued about whether it was a planet or not, the press secretary of the US Naval Observatory Gale Clear in the newsletter of the observatory wrote: “Loor! Have you heard that they want to deprive him of the status of the planet and make it an asteroid there? I personally do not support such attacks. ”

And here I do not agree. Not only does Pluto have five open satellites and who knows how many not open; Having lost the status of the planet, he officially headed the whole army of celestial bodies, the cooper belt - a ring from dwarf planets, asteroids and comets about 3 billion kilometers wide. At Pluto, like Bastard from Dorn in the series “Game of Thrones”, ten thousand brothers and sisters. Or, as the astronomer Hal Levison once said with New Horizons at the Southwestern Research Institute in Texas, "Pluto is the patriarch of the most densely populated area in the solar system, I think it is somehow called a planet."

The story of Pluto is strong and the fact that less than a hundred years have passed from its discovery to the “heart” on Instagram NASA : Clyde Tombo did not live up to the start of the mission to Pluto, which still flew (before that it did not work out). His children were attended at the solemn event in the APL laboratory, from where they control the probe; His ashes, as you know, are on board New Horizons .

The press conferences are over, the hashtag #Plutoflyby left the global trends, the applause subsided. But the story continues: it is Kuiper's belt that are the very new horizons of the American probe. And Pluto is not the main character, but rather a conteran who escorts us into a new act of the performance.