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Asked by keen497aba to Michael S, Martin M, Kirsty R, Alexander dB on 15 Feb 2024.
Question: what really happened to pluto?
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Kirsty Ross answered on 15 Feb 2024:
Pluto was downgraded from a planet for a couple of reasons. A new rule was that a planet should clear it’s orbit of dust and debris, achieving gravitation dominance. Pluto didn’t meet this rule so was downgraded to dwarf planet.
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-33462184
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Martin McCoustra answered on 19 Feb 2024:
Kirsty is right… Basically a bunch of astronomers in the International Astronomical Union decided that pluto wasn’t a planet and so it wasn’t! To be fair to them… Pluto is not quiet like the other planets in the Solar System and shares in orbit with a number of other objects including the moon Charon which is half the size of Pluto… It’s almost as if a bigger planet didn’t quite go together a long time ago.
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Alexander De Bruin answered on 20 Feb 2024:
Pluto is still there, but just got demoted from being a “planet” to being a “dwarf planet”
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Michael Schubert answered on 29 Feb 2024:
Nothing actually happened to Pluto, but when scientists re-evaluated the requirements for being a planet, Pluto didn’t meet all of the requirements they selected. It hasn’t changed, but the rules have!
Comments
Paul commented on :
It was robbed! Bring back Pluto; Size doesn’t matter!
Steve P commented on :
My heart has sympathy for your comment about restoring ‘planet’ status to Pluto, but in fairness to all the other Pluto-similar bodies out there in the Oort cloud, I suggest we aught to admit that (given the evidence we now have), Pluto wasn’t a planet when it was given that status.