Rev 235 T119 flyby Options

[titanicrivers]

Some wide angle camera images just before the T119 flyby seem to show an upper atmospheric disturbance in the raw images with multiple filters. Wonder if this is real or some artifact. The Solar System Simulator and Celestia programs suggest this is in the illuminated portion of the sub Saturn hemisphere of Titan. Not sure of the latitude edge in the WAC images. Doesn’t seem like the N polar region and the S polar region (with the vortex) is in the dark. Images appear below. Glad to see the Ciclops site being updated http://www.ciclops.org/view/8363/Rev235?js=1 and I kinda like the new Cassini website.

[Herobrine]

I'm leaning toward it being an optical effect. For comparison, here's an image from the WAC when it's looking almost directly at the Sun with something scattery (don't ask me what) in the corner of the frame.


Edit: I think we're actually looking toward the Sun with Titan in between in the image above, so the "something scattery" is probably Titan's atmosphere, making this comparison even more appropriate. I'm basing that conclusion solely on the fact that this image of Titan was taken around the same time as the above image (whose target is listed as SUN) and that they look similar.
For additional comparison, here's another one with Titan's atmosphere and the Sun.

[JRehling]

Interesting. The first thing I wonder is: Does this indicate something moving such tremendous distances upwards or, more plausible (?), a change in conditions that allows a photosynthesis process that normally happens lower to happen higher? I wouldn't trust my intuitions either way, but the second one seems like it would require a smaller anomaly than the first one.

[JohnVV]

to me it looks a bit like a internal optics reflection in the lens/camera

[ugordan]

I agree, that is virtually guaranteed to be scattered light in the optics.