海角大神

NASA's long-anticipated flyby of our solar system's erstwhile ninth planet Pluto聽occurred this morning at 7:49 am EDT, exactly on schedule, despite a slight hiccup on July 4, 2015 when the New Horizons聽

Yesterday, NASA鈥檚 Alan Stern tweeted,

New Horizons was ambitious from the start; the spacecraft itself was built in four years and two months and 鈥�,鈥� said Dr. Stern on NASA TV during Tuesday's briefing of the historic event. The team building the spacecraft was on a very tight schedule to make the 2006 launch date; missing the launch window would have meant waiting another four years for Earth and Pluto to line up properly again.聽Stern credits the team for making 鈥渁 lot of sacrifices鈥� to get the project completed on time.

Just before the flyby, NASA released the most detailed image of the icy dwarf planet that we have seen in human history. The floating marble in space is covered in alternating shades of ruddy, sand-colored patches, and was a mere .

The world will have to wait until Wednesday morning at 8:53 am EST (00:53 GMT). This is when NASA is scheduled to receive the trove of information collected from the New Horizons flyby.聽The most recent measurements sent by the New Horizons indicates that聽, or 18.5 percent that of Earth.

鈥楻ight now, we're just standing under the waterfall and enjoying it,鈥� Stern told BBC News.

The 鈥�New Horizons' communications antenna is fixed to the craft, so the craft must reorient itself to properly aim the antenna at Earth. Any attempt to communicate with Earth during the flyby's most critical period would mean pulling the instruments off their targets,鈥� reported 海角大神鈥檚 Pete Spotts on July 12.

The scientists will spend Tuesday analyzing the images that they have received in order to report back to the world tomorrow morning. Tuesday night, they will also learn how much data has been filling up on the memory cards with data taken 5 billion miles away.聽

But the mission far from over after today鈥檚 flyby; the gold-colored space probe will continue to investigate not only Pluto but also its five moons: . Information from NASA has already found that Charon is about the size of Texas, and the 鈥渄ark north polar region is displaying ,鈥� according to the New Horizon鈥檚 website.