24.12.10

Christmas a la Cassini

Since it's Saturnalia, or thereabouts, let's take a look at some of the Cassini images I missed over the past few months:


The familiar icon of a crescent moon is rendered alien in this view of Enceladus bisecting a slender crescent of Saturnian daylight.


Another snap from the same flyby shows Enceladus' characteristic geysers.


Cassini caught a good portrait here of one of Saturn's many smaller, potato-shaped moons: Helene.


Saturn's second largest moon, Rhea, eclipses Titan in a grab for the limelight. Rhea is about a million kilometres away in this image, and Titan 2 million.


Saturn has many cratered, icy moons, but Tethys here shows off one of its most remarkable features: Ithaca Chasma, a massive canyon dwarfed only by Valles Marineris on Mars.

Happy Christmas everyone - whatever planet, moon or ring-system you may call home.

(All images credit NASA/JPL/Space Science Institute.)
at

5 comments:

  1. Geosomin24/12/10 17:55

    Merry Christmas Pacian and Space Cat! :)

    ReplyDelete
  2. Michelle24/12/10 19:23

    Merry Christmas! I wonder why some of the moons are perfectly round while others are not. Hmmm.

    ReplyDelete
  3. Zhoen24/12/10 22:24

    Good Yule, Happy (belated) Solstice. Wonderfully stark images.

    ReplyDelete
  4. Tinker26/12/10 06:05

    Happy, merry Merry Christmas, Pacian and Space Cat!

    ReplyDelete
  5. Pacian28/12/10 10:19

    @All: Thanks, you too!

    @Michelle: It's a matter of size, more or less. The more massive moons have stronger gravity, which smooths out their bumps and irregularities.

    ReplyDelete