NASA's Cassini spacecraft took this raw, unprocessed image of Saturn's moon Rhea on March 10, 2012. The camera was pointing toward Rhea at approximately 26,019 miles (41,873 kilometers) away.
The Cassini spacecraft wandered near Saturn’s icy moon Rhea last week and grabbed some eye candy of the frozen satellite. Rhea is the second largest moon of Saturn, behind the aptly named Titan. Last month Cassini detected a tenuous atmosphere of oxygen and carbon dioxide believed to be the result of Saturn’s magnetic field whipping across the moon’s surface and yanking atoms and molecules loose from other compounds, notably, the frozen water making up the lion’s share of Rhea’s crust and mantle. It is possible this moon also has an internal ocean of slush or liquid water would could hypothetically sustain primitive chemosynthetic bacteria.
Ah! the Beatles, will we ever see their like again.
[meter…meter…meter-maid]
“Lovely Rhea, Saturn’s Maid”
… I see what you did there. Well played, good Sir. Well played indeed.
Cheers! Cassini images never fail to delight and awe and are a welcome respite from some of the disturbing and sometimes sickening political stuff we hear about. Not that its not good / morbidly interesting / necessary to hear about that grim politicial stuff too, just that it often makes for depressing even nauseating reading at times.
The Cassini mission and its scientists show the USA at its best. Oh & Europe too I gather the ESA is also involved, heck it shows Humanity generally at its best. Good to get to see and read of things like this for perspective and relief. :-)