Jason's looking ahead article now available over at ciclops for the next revolution. Great Titan flyby, a look at Rhea, and a far-out (100,000km +) view of Pandora. It will be great to see the other side of Pandora, as the moon seems to have been neglected somewhat (other competing targets of course...) since the flyby five years ago.

Thanks Jason, always appreciated that we're able to be party to upcoming goodies.

Here's Pandora... start and end of the sequence, three frames averaged, with little change in orientation but some change in illumination.

PhilClick to view attachment

Damn, Phil, I just checked for the raws half an hour ago and they weren't up yet. Quick work! Got a few Rhea pics up there now too.

Beautiful, Phil.

Strange-looking thing; oddly looks like a model of itself with the bright (ice?) glints off the crater rims & the subdued topography from ring material deposition.

i swear that i cooked that thing with dinner
sliced and browned in a cast iron skillet

6-frame mosaic of Rhea (go on! I dare ya to find the seams!):

Click to view attachment

A big 4000 x 4000 pixel original size image in all it's icy cratery goodness can be viewed here: http://www.flickr.com/photos/31678681@N07/4670487271/


But there's something kinda strange in this image....

Anybody know what this is? This is an unaltered crop from image N00154971 (I even left the dropouts in).

Click to view attachment

The strange linear feature in the center of the image angles across the JPEG artifacts. Shading comparison with craters would indicate it is a straight trench if it is a surface feature.

I'm going to go out on a limb and suggest that something passed between Cassini and Rhea as the picture was being taken.

Here's the full image deinterlaced.

this shows it all - a chain
Click to view attachment
cleaned up and most jpg artifacts removed
Click to view attachment

i have been seeing these things all over the place
come to think of it isn't there a thread on that someplace ?

It's a real surface feature!

Using Celestia, and Tirawa Crater as a reference, I reckon this feature is at [-37S, 173W] in this image.

A peek at Planetary Photojournal image PIA12561 (Map of Rhea - February 2010) and you can clearly see it at the same location [-35S, 170W] in lower left near the edge of the map]. Shading also appears to make this feature as a trench also.

Great view of Daphinis and another moon creating waves in the latest batch of images on the Cassini raw images page

ttp://saturn.jpl.nasa.gov/multimedia/images/raw/casJPGFullS60/N00154943.jpg

Part of a sequence of images of the rings starting here

http://saturn.jpl.nasa.gov/photos/raw/inde...storedQ=2239945

Cheers

Wow, those are among some of the best shots of Daphinis and its bending waves ever taken. Surprised the viewing is so good several months past equinox. Pan is the other moon and the view of its induced waves is also amazing.

link to image [nomisn's first link is missing an "h" at the start]

If I am interpreting this correctly, we are not seeing shadows projected on the rings, like at equinox, but rather different light reflecting off crests and valleys of induced waves in the ring plane.

Sorry. Thanks Floyd for the correct link. Wow indeed. I agree. One of the best Daphinis wave images so far.

I've puzzled over that before. Straight and uniform with respect to topography, it almost looks "artificial". I concluded that, with all of the crater chains, ejecta scars and tectonic featuress we've seen on the Icy Moons this one just happens to be straight and uniform.

And another amazing image in this batch. In a couple of years (or more?) of looking at Daphnis' bending waves, I don't ever recall seeing them this pronounced and extreme. I wonder if anything has changed at Daphnis to create this difference? Again, it may be one of these statistical fluctuations...

--Bill

I agree but would call it a fracture. No way it's a chain though.

Re: the crater chain, AKA fracture (it could be both, a chain of regolith drainage pits into an open fracture, as often invoked for Phobos)...

Check out this LROC wideangle image of Mare Humboldtianum. By chance it's also today's LPOD.


http://lroc.sese.asu.edu/news/uploads/LROCiotw/HumboltianumCxPRegional_anno.png

http://lpod.wikispaces.com/June+6%2C+2010

An almost identical feature is seen at middle right, south of the big flooded crater.

Phil

OTOH, the lineation could be an immature (or, better, failed) Tiger Stripe of the Enceladus variety.

--Bill

A distant view, but it's nice to see Kraken Mare in the spring sunshine.
http://saturn.jpl.nasa.gov/multimedia/imag...0/N00155189.jpg

the linear features are secondary crater chains formed by material ejected from large basins. They are seen on Ganymede and other satellites, the Moon, Mars, etc. Ive mapped several of them on Tethys and they point back to specific large impacts.