Nuclear payload launching your way Australia, Africa!
On January 10th, the United States has officially notified the United Nations and the International Atomic Energy Agency that NASA is preparing to launch radioactive material.
The rocket launch trajectory is expected to take it near southern Africa and Australia. The UN is notifying these nations of the upcoming launch. NASA has estimated the probability of a launch accident involving the release of plutonium dioxide at about 4 in 1000 (that is 0.4%). If there were a launch accident, the US would offer clean-up help to affected nations.
Intrigued? How come that isn’t headline news? It is, but not in the way you would expect it to be. NASA is not interested in nuking neither Africa nor Australia. Instead, New Horizons, the US Pluto-bound mission is about to begin it’s mission, carrying 10.9 kilograms of radioactive material to power its instruments during its frozen odyssey through the solar system. For those of you Aussie bound, don’t worry. The plutonium dioxide is only weighing 10.9 kilograms so it can’t kill you unless the whole chunk lands right next to you. 
Hopefully come January 17th, Humanity begins its decade long journey to visit to the last planet in our Solar system, Pluto! That’s right, the fastest object to be launched from Earth aimed at the furthest planet in the solar system still takes a loooong time to get there. Even with a speed that will bring it past the Moon in 9 hours instead of the usual 3 days for the Apollo mission!
JHU-APL / SwRI
Now, coming to planets the International Astronomical Union (IAU) has been trying rather unsuccessfully to make a precise definition of what to call a planet. So, by the time New Horizons reaches its primary target of study, that rock surrounded by possibly 3 satellites we call Pluto today may not be called a planet anymore but a planetoid or Kupier Belt Object instead? Well, apparently the astronomers couldn’t agree with the definition, but one thing is clear: Pluto’s planethood stays. There are far too many sentimental humans that would cause a major public uproar if the opposite happens, so that is one reason why the definition is taking such a long time in coming along. With Pluto being a must-include, the list may grow to between 12 to 30 planets, so until the IAU meets again in Prague later this year, nobody can say anything definitely even at this ‘late’ stage.
