Cassini returns images of Saturn's rings

[MetalMilitia]

http://newsimg.bbc.co.uk/media/images/40336000/jpg/_40336793_curve_nasa_203long.jpg

The international mission to Saturn - Cassini-Huygens - has returned the first close-up images of Saturn's rings

The probe successfully entered into orbit around Saturn early on Thursday.

The $3.3bn probe fired its main engine for 95 minutes on Thursday to slow it sufficiently to be captured by the gravity of the sixth planet.

The joint US-European mission has travelled for more than six years and covered over three billion km to get to the ringed planet.

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Did they remember to take the lens cap off?

:rolling:

Just kidding, these photos are spectacular, and new theories about what causes the rings to behave like that are coming out. It makes for a good read.

-MM- :crs:

[Doomer]

Can't wait for the pics from Titan's surface. :thumbs:

[Red Shift]

Yeh, i can't wait till they send that probe thing to Europa because they believe there to be a warm sea deep below the ice, there might be deep sea fish like the types we have on earth <ha ha ha alien fish LOL>

Unfortunatly the probe won't be sent for about ten years, or so i heard! :(

[Doomer]

Yeh, i can't wait till they send that probe thing to Europa because they believe there to be a warm sea deep below the ice, there might be deep sea fish like the types we have on earth <ha ha ha alien fish LOL>

Unfortunatly the probe won't be sent for about ten years, or so i heard! :(
err, Europa is in the Jupiter neighborhood. Cassini ain't going there, sorry.

[Red Shift]

Yeh i know, im just saying i can't wait! ;)

[Doomer]

Yeh i know, im just saying i can't wait! ;)
Sorry, I guess I was on the wrong wavelength. :grin

[Red Shift]

Heh heh thats ok, i guess i was a bit vague with my comment

[Marajadex]

Yeh, i can't wait till they send that probe thing to Europa because they believe there to be a warm sea deep below the ice, there might be deep sea fish like the types we have on earth Go back and read 2001. Arthur C Clarke predicted things about jupiter that years later we found to be true like the markings on IO which look like a big eye. In the book there was a warning not to even attemp to land on Europa. :yikes: I know it is only a sci-fi book but given Clarkes track record for predictions... I am not sure I want to land there.

Although... I would really like to know what is there! :D

[stewey]

What happened in Clarke's book?

[dutchie]

err, Europa is in the Jupiter neighborhood. Cassini ain't going there, sorry.
Cassini is not going to Jupiter either. It is going to circle Saturn (hence the pic) and then the "Huijgens" (another famous Dutchie) probe will be dropped into the atmosphere of Titan. Titan is believed to have large oceans of liquid methane, clouds and rain containing the same stuff, and various carbon based molecules, which could mean that Titan is harbouring life of some sort. Titan is a large moon, larger even than the planet Mercury. Surface temperature is around minus 172 centigrade...

I would put my money on Europa, which very probably has a liquid ocean beneath its icy crust, the inner ice being heated up to a liquid state by friction caused by Jupiter's enormous and fluctuating gravitational pull.

[MetalMilitia]

Dutchie knows what's up :D

Pasedena, CA, Jul. 6 (UPI) -- Space experts at the California control center of the Cassini spacecraft say it has found water ice and hydrocarbons on the surface of Titan.

Cassini has for the first time made a mineral map of Titan, Saturn's largest moon, ABC News reported Tuesday.

It also has shown a diverse, irregular surface, including a possible crater and linear features that could be evidence of geological activity, said a spokesman at the NASA Jet Propulsion Laboratory.

Cassini's latest data also show a large cloud of gas that surrounds both Titan and Saturn, extending far outside the planet's ring system.

What is not yet visible are oceans of methane thought to cover the planet-sized moon.

Earlier pictures of Titan from the Voyager missions and Earth-based telescopes showed very bright patches, which scientists guessed could be continents, and dark patches that could be oceans of methane.

http://washingtontimes.com/upi-breaking/20040706-015309-9913r.htm

Cool Stuff!

[RavenWhitefang]

Well, Huygens has been sent and is now descending into the Titan atmosphere as I type this. Im lucky enough to live in a place that has a live feed into the ESA the european counterpart of NASA. The Huygens beacon has been found by a reciever first in West Virginia, so its got its beacon sending and we are recieving it. This is only the "homing" beacon if you will, and it is not sending any true data at the moment.

From what was being said, we will not get pictures until later this evening/tomorrow as well as the sounds recorded by the microphones on the probe.

For those of you interested in live feeds on this here is the NASA site.

http://www.nasa.gov/multimedia/nasatv/index.html
Real Player or Windows Media required to watch.

[dutchie]

Great!! This is IMO the most exciting stuff since the landing on the moon...

[stewey]

Really interesting read on Clarke

http://www.oup.co.uk/popularscience/extract/clarke/