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NASA spacecraft completes farthest flyby in history. What’s next?
Scientists at last have their first good look at a primordial piece of the solar system orbiting more than four billion miles away.
- Michael Greshko
- National Geographic
Laurel, MarylandOn the final evening of 2018, the biggest New Year’s Eve party in the solar system unfolded across four billion miles of space.
At 12:33 a.m. ET on January 1, NASA’s New Horizons probe flew by a small lump of rock and ice called 2014 MU69.
Also nicknamed Ultima Thule (UL-tee-ma TOO-le), it’s now the most distant, and most primitive, place ever visited by humans.
Due to the vast distance messages must travel between Earth and the spacecraft, members of the…