moons, moons, moons

[mmcirvin]

Janus and Epimetheus, together again. (They do approach pretty closely at times when they do their orbit swap, but here I think one is behind the other.)

Mimas and Rhea, looking like science-fiction cover art again.

Comments

[iayork.livejournal.com]

Are those rings, edge-on, in the left side of Mimas/Rhea and the top center of Janus/Epimetheus?

[mmcirvin.livejournal.com]

Yes, those are the rings. Cassini was orbiting far out of the ring plane for the last several orbits, mostly studying the rings, but the last Titan pass put it near the ring plane again, and it's going to be in or near the ring plane until July studying Saturn's magnetotail and the icy satellites. Which is slightly unfortunate timing considering that the ring spokes may have just reappeared.

[mmcirvin.livejournal.com]

...On the other hand, it might be really interesting to see if any sign of the spokes is visible when the rings are edge-on, if the spoke material is hovering above or below the ring plane.

[mmcirvin.livejournal.com]

Well, well, well, it looks as if the camera team is way ahead of me here (http://saturn.jpl.nasa.gov/multimedia/images/raw/raw-images-details.cfm?feiImageID=49242), though I wouldn't dare to speculate on what we are actually looking at in these overexposed pictures.