August 14, 1994: Hubble telescope tracks rotation of Uranus

On this day in 1994, the NASA Hubble space telescope's image of the planet Uranus reveals the planet's rings, at least five of the inner moons and bright clouds in the planet's southern hemisphere. Hubble's new view was obtained when Uranus was 1.7 billion miles (2.8 billion kilometers) from Earth. Hubble now allows astronomers to revisit the planet at a level of detail not possible since the Voyager 2 spacecraft flew by the planet briefly in 1986.