What dove past Saturn’s rings a few days ago? Cassini!
NASA’s Cassini spacecraft passed above Saturn’s clouds while crossing the plane of the giant planet’s rings on December 4th.
This won’t be the spacecraft’s only close orbit to Saturn’s rings. The mission began its new phase, called Ring-Grazing Orbits, at the end of last month. The orbits take the spacecraft very close to the outer edges of the rings.
Cassini’s final two orbital phases. Credits: NASA/JPL-Caltech
The grey passes in the image will continue until April 2017 when the mission will begin its Grand Finale. At that time, the spacecraft will fly along the blue passes. The orange pass represents the conclusion of Cassini when the spacecraft will dive into Saturn’s atmosphere. This last dive will occur on September 15, 2017.
On this recent pass, Cassini flew through a region that is approximated to have an outer ring that is faint and dusty. The ring was created by Janus and Epimetheus which are small moons of Saturn. During this close encounter, Cassini flew about 57,000 miles above Saturn’s clouds.
By burning its main engine for only about 6 seconds, Cassini’s trajectory was adjusted and the spacecraft flew toward the ring plane. The mission began studying the structure of the rings a few hours after crossing the ring plane.
With more close passes coming up in the mission’s future, Cassini will be sending back fantastic images of the outer regions of Saturn’s rings and small moons. For this first close pass, observations made by other science instruments onboard the spacecraft and its engine maneuver were prioritized.
NASA’s Cassini spacecraft has been studying Saturn, its rings and moons since 2004. After launching in 1997, the spacecraft traveled 2.2 billion miles to reach Saturn.
Learn more about Cassini at NASA.gov.