It is a very historic day, because today an unmanned spacecraft called New Horizons will fly very quickly by Pluto, ending the exploration of all 9 of the major bodies in the solar system.
Pluto, as you probably already know, was discovered in 1930, but was demoted from a planet to a dwarf planet in 2006. Some of the ashes of the man who first discovered Pluto, Clyde Tombaugh, are on board the spacecraft as it hurtles at 10 miles a second past Pluto and it's 5 moons. It'll be a very quick glance, but it'll also be quite the discovery. And I'm glad to say I've been alive for all of man's exploration of space.
I was just 18 months old when the former USSR took the first step into space with Sputnik in November 1957. It was 1959 a Russian probe took the very first pictures of the "dark side of the moon". If you want the whole run-down of the timeline, do a wiki search for it. But suffice it to say in less than 60 years humans have expanded their knowledge of the solar system multiple times through space exploration.
What's to be done now? I'd like to see another manned landing on the moon for starters. Then a mission to Mars, although I don't think that's going to happen in my lifetime.
And yes, for the record, I am a space buff, and am eagerly awaiting images from Pluto.
TTFN
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