2013–2020: New Spacefaring Nations and Sample Return
New Horizons
First close exploration of Pluto; later flew by Arrokoth.
Era 5 of 6 · full record in the catalog
- Launch
- 19 Jan 2006
- Lead / partner
- United States
- Target
- Pluto / Kuiper Belt
- Category
- Dwarf planet flyby
- Status
- Success
- Vehicle
- Atlas V
- Mass
- unknown
- Orbit / trajectory
- unknown
- Duration
- 9.5 years (planned) (elapsed)
Why it happened
New Horizons flew during 2013–2020: New Spacefaring Nations and Sample Return, as part of United States's work toward pluto / kuiper belt. A sourced write-up of the context around this mission is still on the editorial queue; nothing here is invented to fill the gap.
The mission
The full narrative of this mission is pending research and writing. What is recorded so far: First close exploration of Pluto; later flew by Arrokoth.
Results
First close exploration of Pluto; later flew by Arrokoth.
Related missions
Sources & image credits
- Image credit: NASA · license: public-domain (source, checked 2026-08-22)
- Mission record: AntarikshPedia canonical dataset (data-sources/missions_timeline.md)
- Specifications reference: NASA NSSDCA Master Catalog