Uranus Orbiter, The other proposed ice-giant mission Options

[Rob Pinnegar]

Since the Neptune Orbiter thread has started to veer into talking about a Uranus orbiter as well, it seemed like a good idea to start a topic for Uranus.

[Rob Pinnegar]

A couple of random thoughts in favour of Neptune over Uranus (some already stated):

(1) Triton is a wickedly bizarre object worth a mission on its own.
(2) More atmospheric activity on Neptune.
(3) Nereid: captured, or scattered by Triton? If it's scattered, that's *very* interesting.
(4) Is Proteus primordial, or debris that assembled after Triton spoiled the fun?

And in favour of Uranus over Neptune:

(1) More large moons to study. Even Oberon may turn out interesting
(2) Miranda: a currently-dormant Enceladus?
(3) Small inner satellites: how stable are their orbits? Do they hit each other from time to time as has been hypothesized?
(4) Is Ariel still active, even at a "Dione level"?

In favour of both: How the heck did those magnetic dipole fields get tilted over at such crazy angles and displaced from the planets' centres? Something *weird* is going on inside those ice giants, and from a science perspective, at Uranus this could be the single most interesting thing to find out.

But of course, it's going to be Neptune, not Uranus, because no politician is ever going to publicly support a mission that is going to get laughed at on the Tonight Show. If we want that to change, then we'd better think of a different name for Uranus. They shoulda named it Minerva or Apollo or something.

[David]

(3) Small inner satellites: how stable are their orbits? Do they hit each other from time to time as has been hypothesized?

Just the huge number of fast-moving inner satellites means that a close-in orbiter is always going to have something to look at.

But of course, it's going to be Neptune, not Uranus, because no politician is ever going to publicly support a mission that is going to get laughed at on the Tonight Show.

No American politican, I guess you mean. Happily, there are other countries which don't base policy on stupid puns (in somebody else's language).

If we want that to change, then we'd better think of a different name for Uranus. They shoulda named it Minerva or Apollo or something.

They did name it something different. "Georgium Sidus"...