Open Space: May 14, 2018 - Guests Dr. Alan Stern and Dr. David Grinspoon and Chasing New Horizons

This week I'll be joined by Dr. Alan Stern and Dr. David Grinspoon, the co-authors of "Chasing New Horizons: Inside the Epic First Mission to Pluto". Join us live and ask them your questions about the New Horizons Mission and Pluto.

[kodiakfitty]

I finished reading the book a day before this Hangout. It is an awesome read with just the right mix of personal, political and technical details about all aspects of the mission. I was so engrossed that I read 2/3rds of the book in the first sitting.

[GuillaumeDoyen]

*Alan Stern* for the WSH ? Woow ! Amazing. *Well done as always Fraser Cain* ! 👨‍🚀 👍

[madderhat]

Just a reminder to check the address when samples are sent from Mars, or parcels will be marked "Return to Sender"

[phoule]

there's no way in hell that either of these scientists will ever refer to Pluto as anything other than a planet!

[izurielpalanayukei]

With Breakthrough Starshot, since those little probes would be so tiny, is it possible that a small group of citizen scientists could put their own together and send them to space? What do you think the cost of something like that would be? Would we need to hitch a ride on a BFR? Would we have to get our own or use NASA's?

[TomDixonMN]

Great interview about a fantastic book. I just finished the book today. It's a 5 star (out of 5) for sure.

[MichaelOZimmermannJCDECS]

Fraser, have recently tarted watching "The Oeville!m actually very well produced, humorous with good actors. It grows on you...

[deSloleye]

How do things get into orbit around other things? When we play KSP we see that entering the area near a body is along a hyperbolic path. We have to do something, rocket, aero or litho braking, in order to go from that escape trajectory to an orbit. If you aero brake your periapsis stays within the atmosphere and the orbit decays. How does an asteroid or dust go into orbit around a planet? How do planets capture moons?

[richbillbe]

I have an off topic thought concerning the orbits of our solar system and the search for planet 9. Is it possible that planet 9 has a completely different orbit to the rest of the planets of our solar system? Even so much so as to almost intersect Uranus and over time change it’s planetary axis to be completely different to that of the rest of our solar system? So if we aren’t looking in the right direction we will never see it. I’m sure I’m wrong it’s just a random thought.
Thanks Fraser.

[theutopianoutopioan]

In much less than 50 years, people will probably be living throughout much of our solar system! Especially since space travel is getting more affordable and government space agencies are slowly losing their monopolies on space exploration! Hopefully we'll be at that point by the late 2020s.

[theutopianoutopioan]

Maybe we should send many mini SATs to the kuiper belt. These relatively inexpensive mini satellites and probes could be sent to many places for the price of a single mission with a large probe

[sarmatiancougar]

Hello Fraser!
I would like to ask you.
Are all of those light dots in the night sky individual stars?
I mean, since the Sun looks like a standard dot-ish star thingy on the skies of the ice giants regardless of a point blank distance (relatively speaking), it seems like we won’t be able to see it from other stars because of how extremely zoomed out it’s image would be.
Soooo.
Perhaps those objects we see in the sky 🌌 are not individual stars but actually star clusters or even other galaxies?
I mean, it kinda makes sense. You apply the distance from another galaxy to the size thereof and you get some visible dot of light thingy.

I know it’s more of a question about our perspective rather than space but I’d still like to ask a scientist like you since you know for sure.

[giovannifoulmouth]

We need orbiters, landers and rovers around and on all the large bodies of the Solar system! we need to study and understand them as well as we do with Earth.

[theutopianoutopioan]

Pluto defies most logic, First of all, though it's smaller than our moon, Pluto has an atmosphere. No fair! How come Pluto has an atmosphere but Luna doesn't? Secondly, even though Pluto is smaller than the Moon and doesn't orbit a large planet, it's still relatively geologically active. Can anyone explain that?

[cmjnwd]

What if there was a permanent structure built tall at one of the poles of an atmosphere-less moon of Jupiter with an HD video camera that can rotate so it permanently watches Jupiter. If the camera tower was sent after the communication infrastructure was set up video quality capabilities will have increased drastically and we could learn so much about Jupiter and it's atmosphere and be able to have the feed relayed back to Earth reasonably fast

[mikedrop]

Dr Funkyspoon! (Spacetalk radio w/ Neil degrass Tyson reference)

[Barnardrab]

Here's a question for your next Q&A episode:
Is there a website dedicated to the arguments supporting climate change and those denying it?
I don't understand climate science enough to debate it, so when I see someone post some rebuttal against the science, it would be convenient to be able to quickly fact check it.

[twonumber]

At first I was reluctant to reclassify Pluto, but now I think it's right.

[izurielpalanayukei]

39:37
I was in the other room for a second and I heard "Crude and Robotic" and came running in to see what it was about, I thought you were Canadian-ly-mad! Nope, it was about "manned" or "unmanned" missions to Mars as the less-preferred terminology.

[theutopianoutopioan]

A human colony on Pluto? Untill we get faster propulsion technologies, a manned mission to Pluto ain't happening!