A close-up of the canyons on Charon, Pluto’s big moon, taken by New Horizons during its close approach to the Pluto system last July. Multiple views taken by New Horizons as it passed by Charon allow stereo measurements of topography, shown in the color-coded version of the image. The scale bar indicates relative elevation.
Credits: NASA/JHUAPL/SwRI
Pluto’s been getting a lot of attention in the galactic media outlets this past year. Whereas Mars used to be the showstopper, the A-lister, the planet we all fawned over, Pluto is Milky Ways’ sexy new obsession. Maybe it’s the makeover, from ninth planet to not a planet to dwarf planet, that’s piqued our interest. America does love makeovers and comebacks, to be fair. Either way, we’ve discovered that Pluto has snow and ice-covered volcanoes in the last few months. Destination wedding, anyone?
The latest headline from the far reaches of the galaxy is that Pluto’s largest moon, Charon, may have held an ocean. A press release from NASA described images from the agency’s New Horizons mission that suggest a subsurface ocean which has frozen over.
“The side of Pluto’s largest moon viewed by NASA’s passing New Horizons spacecraft in July 2015 is characterized by a system of “pull apart” tectonic faults, which are expressed as ridges, scarps and valleys—the latter sometimes reaching more than 4 miles (6.5 kilometers) deep. Charon’s tectonic landscape shows that, somehow, the moon expanded in its past, and – like Bruce Banner tearing his shirt as he becomes the Incredible Hulk – Charon’s surface fractured as it stretched.”
Yes, NASA really did use an Incredible Hulk analogy to describe the geological happenings on a moon that is three billion miles away. The release then went on to explain that Charon’s outer layer is primarily made of water ice, with the heat of radioactive elements melting the water ice under the surface. Hence, the term “subsurface ocean.” As the moon cooled over time the rest of the water would have frozen completely and expanded, creating the splits and openings we see today.
Considering I hear plenty of people complain about crowds in the lineup every day I think this is great news. Now we know where to send all the salties and wave hogs. If they get there and the place is waveless they can thank karma.
