The New Horizons Spacecraft

Understand

The New Horizons spacecraft was launched on 19 January 2006.

• The spacecraft was designed to provide a platform for seven instruments that will collect and return data from Pluto in 2015.
• The design drew on heritage from previous missions developed at The Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory (APL) and other missions such as Ulysses.
• The trajectory design imposed constraints on mass and structural strength to meet the high launch acceleration needed to reach the Pluto system prior to the year 2020.