First Saturn images of Cassini’s new Orbit
The NASA spacecraft, Cassini, is beginning to send to earth the first views of Saturn's atmosphere since beginning the latest phase of its mission. These new images show views from high above Saturn's northern hemisphere, including the planet's intriguing hexagon-shaped jet stream.
The new mission for Cassini started on November 30, consist of a series of ring-grazing orbits, 30 in all which will carry the spacecraft high above Saturn's northern hemisphere before sending it skimming past the outer edges of the planet's main rings.
On December 2 and 3 the Cassini spacecraft acquired these views, about two days before the first ring-grazing approach to the planet. Future passes will include images from near closest approach, including some of the closest-ever views of the outer rings and small moons that orbit there.
In the words of Carolyn Porco "This is it, the beginning of the end of our historic exploration of Saturn. Let these images -- and those to come -- remind you that we've lived a bold and daring adventure around the solar system's most magnificent planet," Carolyn is Cassini imaging team leader at Space Science Institute, Boulder, Colorado.
The next ring-grazing orbit will be on December 11, passing the outer edges of Saturn’s rings, these will continue until April 22, when the last close flyby of Saturn's moon Titan will once again reshape Cassini's flight path. With that encounter, Cassini will begin its Grand Finale, leaping over the rings and making the first of 22 plunges through the 2,400-kilometer gap between Saturn and its innermost ring on April 26.
The mission will end on September 15 next year with a final dive into Saturn's atmosphere. An opportunity to gather data about the atmosphere's composition until its signal is lost. Cassini was launched in 1997, and it has been around the ring giant since its arrival in 2004 for an up-close study of the planet, one of the most successful NASA missions ever.
A Saturnian Hexagon Collage
This collage of images from NASA's Cassini spacecraft shows Saturn's northern hemisphere and rings as viewed with four different spectral filters. Each filter is sensitive to different wavelengths of light and reveals clouds and hazes at different altitudes.
Clockwise from top left, the filters used are sensitive to violet (420 nanometers), red (648 nanometers), near-infrared (728 nanometers) and infrared (939 nanometers) light.
The image was taken with the Cassini spacecraft wide-angle camera on Dec. 2, 2016, at a distance of about 640,000 kilometers from Saturn. Image scale is 153 kilometers per pixel.
Over Saturn's Turbulent North
This view from NASA's Cassini spacecraft was obtained about half a day before its first close pass by the outer edges of Saturn's main rings during its penultimate mission phase. The view shows part of the giant, hexagon-shaped jet stream around the planet's north pole. Each side of the hexagon is about as wide as Earth. A circular storm lies at the center, at the pole. The image was taken with the Cassini spacecraft wide-angle camera on Dec. 3, 2016, at a distance of about 390,000 kilometers from Saturn. Image scale is 23 kilometers per pixel.
Sources: NASA, JPL
More information about Cassini is at: http://www.nasa.gov/cassini & http://saturn.jpl.nasa.gov
