Chasing New Horizons: Inside the Epic First Mission to Pluto

✍️ Alan Stern

Behind the scenes details from the first mission to Pluto

I will start this review with a disclaimer. This book is not about Pluto. The reader is not going to find detailed information about the planet. This book is all about the New Horizons mission to Pluto. From its genesis to completion. “Chasing New Horizons” is a first-hand report of the mission told from the perspective of its, leader Alan Stern.

First, the book tells us about Stern’s dream to explore Pluto and how long did it take for it to be fullfilled. I would summarize this book in one word: perseverance. It was a long journey with several obstacles: from NASA bureaucracy, which sometimes seemed to be a kafkaesque experience (remember ‘The Castle’? For one moment I thought that Pluto was the castle) to all the politics involved. Also, many times during the read we thought the mission was doomed.

In addition to that the book describes all the challenges of designing a space mission. I was particularly impressed with the amount of work and time required. For example, the Pluto fly-by, which took a dozen days, needed three years to be carefully designed and tested. In the end it was a great win and New Horizons gave us spectacular images of Pluto and its satellites. Great story with a happy ending.

P.S.: The book ends with a small appendix describing the major scientific discoveries by New Horizons.