KSC-05PD-2229

KENNEDY SPACE CENTER, FLA. - At NASA Kennedy Space Center’s Shuttle Landing Facility, workers move a nitrogen tank to a nearby transporter. The equipment is part of the cargo delivered aboard a U.S. Air Force C-17 cargo plane (in the background), primarily the Pluto New Horizons spacecraft. After it is unloaded, the spacecraft will be transported to the Payload Hazardous Servicing Facility. The nitrogen provides a purge to keep components cool and dry during processing.New Horizons is designed to help us understand worlds at the edge of our solar system by making the first reconnaissance of Pluto and Charon - a 'double planet' and the last planet in our solar system to be visited by spacecraft. The mission will then visit one or more objects in the Kuiper Belt region beyond Neptune. New Horizons is scheduled to launch in January 2006, swing past Jupiter for a gravity boost and scientific studies in February or March 2007, and reach Pluto and its moon, Charon, in July 2015.