'NOVA: Chasing Pluto'
(DVD / NR / 2015 / PBS)
Overview: NOVA captures New Horizons' historic flyby of Pluto, the culmination of the spacecraft's nine-year, three-billion-mile journey to reveal the first ever detailed images of this strange, icy world at the very edge of our solar system.
DVD Verdict: As we quickly discover, at 65 miles per hour it will take some 6,206 years to get to frozen Pluto, some three billion miles away ... and yet NASA did it in only 10 years! What is important is to realize that the technology that we have now did not exist 10 years ago, but more importantly nothing close to what we have now when NASA started planning a trip to Pluto.
For NEW HORIZON to capture images of Pluto as it comes to focus was the dream of many dedicated scientists who convinced US to put up the money and although a project like NEW HORIZON needs many geniuses to achieve its goal, we need to be thankful to self educated farm boy, Clyde Tombaugh who discovered Pluto on March 14th, 1930.
As we learn, discovery for Clyde meant free schooling since he had no money to attend school. An average radio station on earth uses 50,000 watts to transmit a signal. The space craft uses only 10; yes only ten watts to require a signal pick up on earth. That amazing technology comes with education.
And, as we all know, education is such an important part of a society and the shameful part of the whole equation is that as intelligent as Americans are, it seems they will never find a solution to the failing corrupt school system in New Jersey and many other states in the Union.
Realigning my review, sorry for that, in closing, 'NOVA: Chasing Pluto' is a true insight for us all, as we go behind the scenes to witness the historic moment when, back on Earth, the planetary scientists who spent decades working on this mission to receive the anticipated signal from their spacecraft, finally get their just reward. Them together, we get to look at Pluto's mysterious surface in unprecedented detail and explore new secrets about other "alien worlds" at the far limits of our very own solar system. Well done PBS. Bravo! This is a Widescreen Presentation (1.85:1) enhanced for 16x9 TVs.
www.PBS.org