Solar System Fossils Found By Hubble

segment writes "Astronomers using NASA's Hubble Space Telescope have discovered three of the faintest and smallest objects ever detected beyond Neptune. Each lump of ice and rock is roughly the size of Philadelphia and orbits just beyond Neptune and Pluto, where they may have rested since the formation of the solar system 4.5 billion years ago. The objects reside in a ring-shaped region called the Kuiper Belt, which houses a swarm of icy rocks that are leftover building blocks, or "planetesimals," from the solar system's creation. The results of the search were announced by a group led by Gary Bernstein of the University of Pennsylvania at a meeting of NASA's Division of Planetary Sciences in Monterey, Calif."

Comments

What can we do with them

[Anonymous Coward]

Can we invade them for oil? take over their population, oust their government and continue to wage war on their surface for another decade?

no?

pfft. what use are they then?

Size of Philadelphia

[bartyboy]

In case you didn't read it, the article says:

"The three small objects the astronomers spotted - given the prosaic names 2003 BF91, 2003 BG91 and 2003 BH91 - range in size from 15 to 28 miles

Hence the size of Philadelphia varies from 15 to 28 miles. Oh, and Philadelphia is a also an irregular sphere.

"roughly the size of Philadelphia"

[mirko]

Excuse me, Sir :
In Armageddon, the meteor was "as big as Texas", now, this one is "roughly the size of Philadelphia".
Now, for the non-US guys here, could you translate ?

Philadelphia?

[Dazhel]

...Each lump of ice and rock is roughly the size of Philadelphia...

Yeah but how much would they weigh at sea level in metric elephants?

Media Size Scale

[Sr. Zezinho]

Official Media Size Scale:

• 1 - VW Beetle
• 2 - Schoolbus
• 3 - Football Field
• 4 - Philadelphia
• 5 - Texas
• 6 - ??????
• 7 - Profit!