In his recent speech at the FIRST Robotics Event in Oklahoma, the NASA chief, Jim Bridenstine said that he goes against the convention that Pluto is not a planet.
The controversy over Pluto to be reclassified as a planet has always been underway. This time, the debate has been once again pulled over by NASA chief, who strongly believes that the celestial body is a planet.
In his recent speech at the FIRST Robotics Event in Oklahoma, the NASA chief, Jim Bridenstine said that he goes against the convention that Pluto is not a planet. A video that has been shared by meteorologist Cory Reppenhagen on Twitter shows Bridenstine state, "Just so you know, in my view Pluto is a planet.” He further added that, "You can write that the Nasa administrator declared Pluto a planet once again. I’m sticking by that, it’s the way I learned it and I’m committed to it."
NASA's statement goes against the official decision of the International Astronomical Union (IAU), which demoted Pluto as a planet in 2006 and classified it as a dwarf planet.
The decision to exclude Pluto from the 'planet-hood' was all the more affirming after the discovery of another distant celestial body, Eris, in 2005 which led IAU to lay down three guidelines. These three guidelines had to be adhered by any body to officially constitute itself as a planet.
However, Pluto didn't fall under all the guidelines due to its placement in the Kuiper Belt and along with Eris, it was put under the belt of dwarf planets.
Pluto was discovered by American astronomer Clyde Tombaugh in 1930 and then it was considered as the ninth planet of the Solar System.