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21 Jul, 2015

Discovers second mountain range

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A newly discovered mountain range lies near the southwestern margin of Pluto’s heart-shaped Tombaugh Regio (Tombaugh Region), situated between bright, icy plains and dark, heavily-cratered terrain. This image was acquired by New Horizons’ Long Range Reconnaissance Imager (LORRI) on July 14, 2015, from a distance of 48,000 miles (77,000 kilometers) and sent back to Earth on July 20. Feature as small as a half-mile (1 kilometer) across are visible. These frozen peaks are estimated to be one-half mile to one mile (1-1.5 kilometers) high, about the same height as the United States’ Appalachian Mountains. The Norgay Montes (Norgay Mountains) discovered by New Horizons on July 15 more closely approximate the height of the taller Rocky Mountains. NASA releases a photo showing another mountain range on the lower left edge of Pluto’s heart-shaped region. The peaks are about 1 to 1.5 km (0.5 to 1 mile) high, about the size of the Appalachians. The new range is just west of the region within Pluto’s heart called Sputnik Planum (Sputnik Plain) and some 110 km (68 miles) northwest of Norgay Montes. This newest image further illustrates the remarkably well-defined topography along the western edge of Tombaugh Regio.

There is a pronounced difference in texture between the younger, frozen plains to the east and the dark, heavily-cratered terrain to the west. There’s a complex interaction going on between the bright and the dark materials that we’re still trying to understand.

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