Photos: Delta 4-Heavy launch gallery

Weather forecasters will watch for isolated rain showers and gusty winds that could delay Thursday’s launch of a Delta 4-Heavy rocket carrying NASA’s Orion space capsule on its first flight into orbit.

New Horizons Mission Operations Manager (MOM) Alice Bowman describes how New Horizons will turn to Earth and ‘phone home’ to confirm if the flyby of Ultima Thule was a success.

A new image captured minutes before NASA’s New Horizons probe zipped by a rocky object in the Kuiper Belt on New Year’s Day shows the dual-lobed world — nicknamed Ultima Thule — is covered with intriguing fractures and a large crater-like depression that could provide clues about the early history of the solar system.