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As New Horizons passes each planet's orbit on the way to
Pluto, check back here to see where the planet was when our
intrepid spacecraft zoomed by.
Passing the Orbit of Saturn
New Horizons crossed the orbit of Saturn on June 8, 2008. Spinning in stable electronic hibernation, New Horizons reached a distance of 935 million miles (about 1.5 billion kilometers) from the Sun at 10:00 UTC, becoming the first spacecraft to journey beyond Saturn’s orbit since Voyager 2 passed the ringed planet nearly 27 years ago.
Voyager 1 and 2, at the edge of the Sun’s heliosphere some 100 astronomical units away, are the only spacecraft operating farther out than New Horizons.
Next up: Uranus
New Horizons passes the orbit of Uranus on March 18, 2011.
Projected Orbit Crossing Dates
The computer-generated images above are simulated views of
New Horizons' location in the solar system. The images were
created using the Satellite Tool Kit (STK) software, which
was developed by Analytical Graphics, Inc. |
