Pluto's layered atmosphere
Pluto's layered atmosphere
Just 15 minutes after its closest approach to Pluto on 14 July 2015, NASA’s New Horizons spacecraft looked back towards the Sun and captured this view of the rugged, icy mountains and flat ice plains that extend to the horizon of Pluto. The smooth surface of the icy Sputnik Planitia (on the right) is bordered to the West (on the left) by rugged mountains rising up to 3,500 metres, including the Norgay Montes in the foreground and the Hillary Montes near the horizon. To the right, east of Sputnik Planitia, rougher terrain is intersected by swathes of ice surfaces resembling glaciers. The view against the faint light of the Sun highlights more than a dozen layers of haze in Pluto’s thin atmosphere, which still extends to altitudes of over 100 kilometres. The image was taken from a distance of 18,000 kilometres beyond Pluto. The scene has a width of 1,250 kilometres.
