Its been a while since I have updated the progress on IMAX in a Basement, which features imagery from the Cassini mission. See youTube for a nice “Problems Solved” video that includes a sweet sweep across what looks like Enceladus toward Saturn.
Tomorrow’s Cassini buzz of Enceladus is closer than ever not only at Enceladus, but at any other body in the Saturnian system. It is to come only 25km from the surface. It is to fly deep into the plumes, but this visit is more about smell than vision. Imagery is not expected to be as impressive as August’s pass despite the close proximity due to the spacecraft‘s instruments concentrating on particles and dust analysis and not pretty pictures.
This is a somewhat new view of Enceladus. Most global images we have seen show both the ridges and the cratered areas, whereas this image features almost exclusively the wrinkled terrain. Few craters are visible in this area which suggests that the details of its surface are quite young.
Here is one of the vents pinpointed by the Cassini team. This was the only one of the four that seemed obvious to me in appearance. There are boulders scattered throughout the area, but you have to note the larger accumulation of boulders here at the center of this image where one of the 4 vents were revealed. It is conceivable that larger chunks of material (as well as fine particles) could potentially have been spewed from these vents occasionally or perhaps thousands of years ago… or both.
See this and all the other located vents of Baghdad / Cairo Sulci and of Damascus Sulcus at the Cyclops Cassini Imaging site.
On Cassini’s close shave of Enceladus it captured and image of what seems to be a strange tall mound of something at middle right. Look at how long a shadow it casts.
This is also in semi-false/true color using infrared, green and ultraviolet for RGB. Can you tell from its richness of color?!
I am no scientist, but I would think that the wispy soft lines billowing from this fracture on Enceladus are the famed geysers we have seen so much of from a distance (see the upper right side of the fracture in particular). The geysers have been easily seen from more distant and back-lit images taken of Enceladus, and we know this area being imaged is the source. So wouldn’t it be fairly safe to assume that it is happening in several of these frames?
It may just be that the particles are too fine to be seen at this distance. Consider that they previously have only visible at greater distances when the plumes are back-lit in low-light situations. Seeing this activity from this distance may be kind of like trying to see a cloud when you are already in it… only harder.
From around 1288 km. Looks like T minus 10 seconds to touch down!
From 1567 km.
From 2621 km.
Closest image returned so far. Lots of missing data on the right was duplicated to fill in the gaps. This results in the right side looking lower in resolution than the left.
A June 30 image of Enceladus for a teaser. Nothing has yet been posted to the mission site from Cassini’s close shave. Let’s hope there are no glitches this time!
Its been slow around here lately, but the Aug 11 planned close flyby of Enceladus should spice things up a bit. Cassini is now in it’s extended mission and Enceladus has been made a secondary target for the coming months with the primary target being the continued exploration of Titan.
3 intensely nice new views of Saturn by Gordan Ugarkovic.
Be sure to click for the hi-res view of this one. Enceladus hangs sharply in front of saturn – doesn’t even look real. I assume the second moon there is Mimas, but notice you can even make out a 3rd moon (Pandora) lodged in Saturn’s rings, right inside the hairline F-Ring.
Cassini moves away from it’s risky encounter at Enceladus… This came out so cool that it looks fake.
IMAGE NOTE: 3 frames of this 13 frame animation were “faked” in that adjacent frames were used to fill in gaps. The size and position of Enceladus was simply adjusted on these frames to create a smoother transition where needed. Additionally, the last 3 frames had stars added to the background for consistency.
The almost surreal nature of this image is due to this: Nothing in this image is sunlit. According to Emily Lackdawalla’s Planetary Society blog, the lower brightest area is lit by the rings of Saturn, by way of reflection off of Saturn’s disc. The right hand side is comparatively low-lit by the moons Tethys and Dione and the left side is also low-lit by the moon Rhea. To the human eye, this scene would appear far darker than seen here and is a testament to the sensitivity of Cassini’s cameras in low-lit situations. If the sun-lit side of Enceladus presented itself here, it would be a complete white out devoid of any details.
My best guess for all the dots is that some are actually star light, while others are anomalies in the imaging process… for instance, the specks in the image that appear over the disc itself are surely noise.
Made partly from the image from the previous post. Click to see it high resolution.
There is word also that some of the instruments failed to relay data. This would be disappointing to say the least. Considering the risk taken to get this close to the plumes… it would be sad to not have the data they were looking for.