The National Space Society has announced its support for an effort to honor the New Horizons mission to Pluto and the Kuiper Belt with a United States Postal Service (USPS) stamp. The on-going petition effort seeks to gather 100,000 signatures by March 13, 2012.

Since there is a three-year time lead for approval of commemorative stamps, the plan is to gather enough signatures for the stamp to come out in 2015, just in time for New Horizon’s arrival at Pluto.

After traveling for 10 years and more than 3 billion miles, the New Horizons spacecraft is more than half the way to Pluto and due to arrive on July 14, 2015. Upon arrival, New Horizons will complete the first human reconnaissance of Pluto and will visit one or more Kuiper Belt Objects before exiting the outer solar system.

Working with New Horizons’ principal investigator, Dr. Alan Stern, NSS has urged its over 10,000 members and friends to support this campaign through a variety of communications, including the NSS web site, blog, and social networking pages/groups.

“New Horizons will finally complete our initial picture of the solar system,” says NSS Executive Director Paul Damphousse. “This mission is another important step on our journey to create a spacefaring civilization and we are proud to support this effort.”

Please join the hundreds of NSS members who have already signed the petition by visiting the stamp drive web site at tinyurl.com/plutostamp.