Elevation map with raised rim and central depression.
Splattered red debris with highest concentrations creating a central oblong circle.
1994 JR1 is a red Plutino object perturbed by Pluto organized by Neptune. Its size aligns with Mordor's footprint. JR1 demonstrates how there are objects within striking range of Pluto that exactly match in composition and size the impact crater at Mordor.
Southern hemisphere had chunks knocked off it's surface; supporting evidence.
There are vast quantities of varying sized angular debris littering the taffy like southern hemisphere (Vulcan Planum) of Charon indicating bits and pieces were knocked off then gravitationally pulled gently back onto the surface. This process took enough time to allow the fluid to begin hardening which froze the chunks in place like a time capsule.
There is a fracture running from an impact site at 8 O-Clock diagonally up to an area at 2 O-Clock where a 6 mile deep canyon exist and it looks somewhat circular almost as if this cork like zone nearly got popped off Charon. This impact cracked Charon's crust along this diagonal line then a series of impacts occurred at the north pole. These events could have dislodged pieces from the southern hemisphere.
The quarter section of Charon that is liquefied along with Sputnik Planum and the large irregular disturbances on Pluto all align with each other suggesting their gravitational pull played a roll in this liquefication process.
Pluto has angular disruptions on the side facing Charon potentially suggesting that fragments from Charon were launched into space and hit Pluto. This may not be accurate, as the images of Pluto's Charon facing side are blurred and not very clear.
Orbiting debris called moons have albedos similar to but lighter than Charon's surface. While Nix likely came from Pluto, Hydra's albedo and orbital distance suggest it could be a chunk of Charon. Ice chunks knocked off Charon would tend to be lighter in reflectance as the edges that were not exposed to the Sun while connected to Charon, would now be clearly visible and more reflective this is what Hydra displays with its reflectance.
Pluto's Moons
Styx, Nix, Kerberos and Hydra are young; supporting evidence.
Their albedos are too bright to be 4 billion years old. If these four moons were 4 billion years old then their reflectance would be much lower and in line with Charon and Pluto as their surfaces would have been baked and cooked by UV radiation long enough to make them theoretically at least as dark as Charon and or Pluto.
Nix was impacted by a red tholin covered object which came from Pluto's surface. Pluto had to form and grow to a large enough size over hundreds of millions of years with enough methane to form hydrocarbons called tholin. It then had to get captured by Neptune into a 3:2 resonance (the Nice model suggest Neptune took many millions of years to develop then migrate to its current orbit), Pluto had to get pushed into an eccentric orbit by Neptune in order to orbit close enough to the Sun's UV radiation long enough to create tholin. Pluto had to orbit elliptically around the Sun for a long time in order to develop a thick red tar base of tholin on its surface. Then Pluto had to get impacted and have a chunk knocked off for a red tholin covered ice rock to eject into space. That chunk had to orbit in the same zone as Nix for some time then collide with Nix. All these other conditions had to precede this impact on Nix, indicating Nix is relatively young.
Another possibility is that the red impacting object that created Mordor sent a fragment into orbit impacting Nix. Still Nix is almost as bright as white ice suggesting it came from SP so Pluto would have to be around long enough to get large enough for an impact to knock a chunk off Pluto at SP. In either case the moons are young.
The four moon's have radically different and irregular wobbles suggesting they are yet to settle down but their orbits are circular indicating some ageing time frame has taken place. In other words, they are potentially young based on wobble but not that young based on circular orbits. Their irregular spins might also be due to the pulsating gravitational waves created by both Pluto and Charon. (this may be a permanent irregularity induced by the binary pair). Their circular not eccentric orbits does suggest they may not be terribly young. Their rate of spin and circular orbit sorta present potential conflicting conclusions about their age.
Sputnik Planum has deep V shaped pits along its southern edge, suggesting chunks are missing from Pluto at this location. These pits along with the red impact on Nix and the four moons albedos suggest at least some of the moons are fragments from Pluto and were created at the same time Sputnik Planum came into existence.
The orbit's of Styx and Nix are near Pluto suggesting the ejection velocity of these two moons was less than that of Kerberos and Hydra. This aligns with the idea the red tholin covered object that impacted Nix was from Pluto as well as the extreme brightness of Nix compared to Hydra's darker reflectance and no red colored impacts.
Consider the odds, Hydra which is darker than Nix but brighter than Charon is in a higher orbit displaying impacts but none of them are red while Nix bright like white ice (brighter than Hydra) was impacted by a red tholin covered smaller object with both objects orbiting closer to Pluto. Hydra's reflectance is similar to Charon yet just slightly brighter and had greater launch capacity, Nix's reflectance is similar to Pluto and had less launch capacity. The north pole of Charon is impacted at Mordor, dark objects flew off Charon with high velocity some enter high orbit others hit Pluto. Bright ice shards and red tholin covered objects eject from Pluto with low velocity entering low orbits colliding with each other.
Charon's smooth southern hemisphere at Vulcan Planum is littered with angular rocky chunks of ice debris suggesting pieces of its surface were knocked off some of which fell back down onto the surface and others were launched into space becoming what we now call Kerberos and Hydra.
Sputnik Planum
Sputnik Planum's existence was initiated by impacts; supporting evidence.
The impact at Mordor along with,
the subsequent angular fragments on Charon's smooth southern hemisphere along with,
the subsequent large angular disturbances to Pluto's Charon facing side along with,
the subsequent deep pits at the southern edge of SP created by phonon shock waves along with,
the subsequent orbiting debris called Styx, Nix, Kerberos and Hydra suggest all these events are tied together.
Sputnik Planum is not the result of a direct hit, if it were there would be splattered debris left around the edges in a circular pattern we see neither.
The deepest part of a direct hit impact would have been at the northern portion of SP not at the pointy smaller area in the south where there is evidence of deep pits. Conversely we can see by the polygonal troughs in the nitrogen fluid that the larger northern portion of SP is the shallow section. The ground up ice blocks along the north western edge of SP also demonstrate how the northern area is shallower than the south. These are the exact opposite conditions you would see if an object created SP by a direct hit.
Sputnik Planum is sustained by tidal flexing; supporting evidence.
At perihelion the Sun, Charon and Pluto align linearly creating greater gravitational pull which in turn induces tidal flexing. Pluto and Charon orbit each other every 6.4 days meaning every 3.2 days one then the other aligns with the Sun during perihelion creating tidal flexing during this alignment period.
The ridge line along the western edge of SP is lined with cryovolcanic fissures indicating Pluto is ripping apart at this location. Tall ice blocks line the western edge of SP near the cryovolcanoes indicating Pluto is being actively ripped apart at this location as Pluto is flexed by tidal forces and heated creating massive broken ice blocks.
A large block of land ice sandwiched between the cryovolcanoes and SP has broken and fallen into its basin similar to Thingvellir Iceland.
There are compressive forces due to tidal flexing taking place along the ridge line that runs from the North to South pole and can be clearly seen near the South pole area as ripples and folds in the land ice. Along the equatorial ridge line there is a bulge in the land ice (Viking Terra) as well as massive fractured angular blocks of land ice. Further north along the ridge line are elevated methane snow covered mountains with long canyons lightly baked by UV Sun light displaying an orange tholin looking series of rolling hills. These are fold mountains which is the definition of tectonics aka compression mountains.
The pseudo volcano called Wright Mons is instead created by 2 mile high by 4 mile deep ice blocks colliding with and folding into muddy land creating eddys behind the ice blocks. These could also be considered fold mountains.
The magma like nitrogen wraps around Pluto's equatorial region far beyond SP to the east suggesting Pluto's spin is distributing the nitrogen magma around the equator eastwards away from the newly ripping opened western edge.
The dynamic tidal flexing activities at SP are a currently occurring event evidenced by the fact Sputnik Planum, the wetlands, Tartarus Dorsa and eastwards show no signs of impacts. This is a sign of current tidal flexing working in conjunction with the Sun's UV radiation at perihelion creating atmospheric gasses along with toothpaste like fluid glaciers, mud like magma and liquids seen in lakes and running tributaries. This is a current and active process.
SP is a basin filled with magma like nitrogen being squeezed up through the subsurface fractured land. As this basin is formed by the land collapsing into a Pluto cavity (from the compressive gravitational force of Pluto and Charon) which exist beneath the surface, nitrogen fluid is pushed up and out from below at the wetlands and Tartarus Dorsa and to the east. This expulsion of magma at Tartarus Dorsa creates the subsurface cavity below SP just like we see at Thingvellir Iceland.
Tartarus Dorsa is mounds of frozen mud like nitrogen welling up from below the surface creating mud dauber's which become south facing wind blown scarps and mountain ridge lines bounded by fractures (created by subsurface pressures) leading to the heart of the spider where there is another cryovolcano. These formations are very young and are being frequently renewed as no impacts are visible. Every orbital cycle around the Sun, Pluto is stretched and pulled releasing toothpaste consistency magma nitrogen fluid, gray water nitrogen fluid and atmospheric nitrogen gasses.
Pluto's stretch marks or extensional fractures are caused by the tidal stretching and fluid nitrogen which expands as it becomes heated to its liquid state. The Tartarus Dorsa mounds with their extensional fractures leading to the spider demonstrate how the nitrogen magma that is building up on the surface through venting mud holes shaped like wind blown mud dauber mounds is also expanding the crust from below creating fractures.
There may be a radioactive core heating Pluto but after 4 billion years and the size of Pluto, one would expect it's heat energy to be quite low, too low in fact to melt ice into water (even if laced with sulfur) at 40K, However, a core might be just warm enough to turn nitrogen into a magma of sorts allowing tidal flexing to perform the kneading process required for all the other geological activities seen at SP and eastwards. The extensional fractures do not display the presence of oxygen which suggest there is no alpha radiation combining with nitrogen to create oxygen indicating part of the radioactive core model has some holes in it.
A sea of nitrogen visible on the surface suggest there is an ocean of nitrogen below. This in turn suggest Pluto's crust is separated from an inner core. This core could either be ice or radioactive rock. The quantity of nitrogen on the surface suggest enough rock likely separated out to create a silicate rocky core at least partially.
Pluto is likely differentiated as evidenced by all the fluid nitrogen and outer and inner separated sphere helped create its 120 degree gyroscopic gravitational uneven mass distributed torque induced tilt. In other words Pluto and Charon probably did not collide but instead Charon is a captured KBO brought into close proximity by Neptune. Seeing as how there are something like 130 gravitationally captured moons in our solar system and only one that may or may not have formed from a collision it is mathematically more likely Pluto and Charon never collided. Comet 67P demonstrates how large objects can be conjoined slow enough so that one does not disrupt the strata of the other. Pluto and Charon may be migrating slowly towards each other.
Agendas
Many theories about Pluto exist some make sense some don't while others simply exist to further the agenda of the creator of the theory. There are nuts out there selling their wares so buyer (or believer) be aware, develop your own theory based on as much first hand knowledge as you can get your hands on. Cornell University Library is a great place to start. Harvard's site is not as good but it's better than google. Wikipedia has some pretty good stuff. Use your own knowledge and thoughts, don't just believe something someone says. While the universe can stretch reason to its breaking point, it is still the best place to start and should never be abandoned just because the universe is so complex and diverse.
When I started this exploration of discovery into Pluto, I probably understood about a tenth of what I know now. Ignorance is not an excuse so learn, teach yourself, educate yourself so you don't have to believe anyone but yourself.
Finally! Whew!!!! I think I'm done with Pluto, but I've said that several times before, each time I've come back and learned more and more so who knows. If Pluto/Charon has more to teach, I will listen. There are still things about this system that are bugging me.
A final note of appreciation goes out to several members of Zooniverse and especially the person without whom this site wouldn't exist,