The first-ever closeup view of Pluto’s surface from the flyby by New Horizons has been released, as well as the best view yet of Pluto’s largest moon, Charon. The new Pluto image shows mountains up to 3,500 metres (11,000 feet) tall in this region, unexpected on such a small, cold planetary body. They are thought to be made of solid water ice and no more than 100,000 years old, which is very young geologically. Those and other features suggest that Pluto may still be geologically active even now.
The new image of Charon also shows that at least some of the surface is relatively young, with fewer craters than expected. There are also cliffs and canyons, more signs of geological activity. The canyon on the upper right edge of image is about 7 to 9 kilometres (4 to 6 miles deep). The other one stretching across the image is about 1,000 kilometres (600 miles) long.
More images will be released soon!
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