NASA's Pluto spacecraft adjusts course on its way to next icy world

The NASA spacecraft that explored Pluto has adjusted course as its next target looms.

New Horizons fired its thrusters late Wednesday way out in our solar system's so-called KuiperBelt, a disk of icy worlds beyond Neptune. That puts the spacecraft on track for a New Year's Day flyby of a teeny, frigid world dubbed Ultima Thule.The name comes from medieval maps and literature.

Lead scientist Alan Stern is tweeting, "YEAH! Go Baby Go!"

New Horizons became the first spacecraft to visit Pluto in 2015. Its flyby revealed a world that astounded planetary scientists.

It found that the dwarf planet had a thin, blue atmosphere, as well as nitrogen glaciers, mountain ranges and even a desert.

The spacecraft's next target is 1.6 billion kilometresbeyond Pluto and a whopping 6.4 billion kilometres from us. So, 13 years after rocketing from Florida, New Horizons will break its own record for humanity's most distant tour of a cosmic object.