What's Up? The Space Place

Hey Space Placers! Ever seen “Old Faithful” or other smaller geysers erupt at beautiful Yellowstone National Park   http://www.nps.gov/yell/planyourvisit/exploreoldfaithful.htm     ? It is quite the sight. Located on a small, ice covered moon around the ringed planet Saturn there is a continuous eruption of huge Yellowstone-like geysers that an intrepid spacecraft will fly through at very close range to further discern their secrets. On Wednesday morning the Cassini spacecraft http://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/cassini/main/index.html     that has been exploring the Saturn system for over 11 years will perform its 21st flyby  http://www.jpl.nasa.gov/news/news.php?release=2015-328     of Enceladus, the amazing ice covered moon with a global sub-surface ocean. This daring flyby will be only 30 miles above the South Pole of Enceladus   https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BZ1KowQXc3Y     and it will be the deepest penetration ever ...

Hey Space Placers! NASA's Cassini spacecraft has spent 11 years studying the ringed planet and its moons. In the past week Cassini started its final series of flybys of Enceladus. The returned pics have been amazing as can be seen in this close up of the moon's North pole . NASA JPL The closest pics are to be taken on October 28th as the spacecraft will zoom to within a mere 30 miles above the frozen and contorted surface of Enceladus. This will be Cassini's deepest penetration of the icy spray plumes that erupt out of cracks in the moon's frozen surface. Enceladus has a global ocean underneath its icy surface and is a desire future mission for NASA. The exploration of this ocean would give us our first look at such a feature beyond our own planet and who knows what we would find. Sky Guy in VA

Hey Space Placers! The European SPace Agency (ESA) has discovered that Enceladus, pictured above, is raining water onto Saturn from plumes expelling water. As stated by ESA:  "ESA’s Herschel space observatory has shown that water expelled from the moon Enceladus forms a giant torus of water vapour around Saturn. The discovery solves a 14-year mystery by identifying the source of the water in Saturn’s upper atmosphere. Herschel’s latest results mean that Enceladus is the only moon in the Solar System known to influence the chemical composition of its parent planet. Enceladus expels around 250 kg of water vapour every second, through a collection of jets from the south polar region known as the Tiger Stripes because of their distinctive surface markings." Read More About It: http://www.esa.int/export/esaSC/SEMNGHFTFQG_index_0.html Sky Guy in VA

Hey Space Placers! Surf's Up on Saturn's moon Enceladus. Check out the spewing spray as caught by the Cassini spacecraft: NASA's Cassini spacecraft has discovered the best evidence yet for a large-scale saltwater reservoir beneath the icy crust of Saturn's moon Enceladus. The data came from the spacecraft's direct analysis of salt-rich ice grains close to the jets ejected from the moon. NASA JPL From NASA's press release: "The salt-rich particles have an "ocean-like" composition and indicate that most, if not all, of the expelled ice and water vapor comes from the evaporation of liquid salt water. The findings appear in this week's issue of the journal Nature." "There currently is no plausible way to produce a steady outflow of salt-rich grains from solid ice across all the tiger stripes other than salt water under Enceladus's icy surface," said Frank Postberg, a Cassini team scientist at the University of Heidelbe...