NASA’s New Horizons probe is taking a long nap as it prepares to meet up with a distant icy space rock
NASA’s New Horizons spacecraft — which famously flew by Pluto in the summer of 2015 — is going to sleep for a little while as it speeds toward its next destination at the edge of the Solar System. On April 7th, the vehicle went into hibernation, a mode in which most of its instruments are powered off. This extended nap, which will last until September 11th, will help keep New Horizons in a safe, stabilized state while reducing the wear and tear on some of the probe’s instruments.
But the biggest benefit of hibernation is that the vehicle will need less oversight from mission control back on Earth, and that’s crucial right now. The New Horizons team is about to prepare for the spacecraft’s next task: flying by an icy body at the edge of…
