[X] My Assistant

[alan]

Rev 46 description available at CICLOPS

http://ciclops.org/view.php?id=3245

Some highlights:

Cassini will observe Mimas, the innermost of the mid-sized icy satellites of Saturn

June 12, Cassini makes one of its closest passes of the small, inner satellite Atlas, at a distance of only 38,000 km (24,000 mi). With an average diameter of only 31 km (19 mi), Atlas is one of the smallest moons of Saturn. Atlas will only appear to be 120 pixels across (at the equator). However, these images may still provide important clues about the formation of one of the most distinguishing aspects of the tiny satellite: its equatorial bulge. The bulge is thought to have been created by material from Saturn’s A ring being deposited preferentially along the equator of the satellite.

A number of observations are dedicated to observing some of Saturn's small moons, in order to refine scientists' estimates of their orbital paths. These sequences include observations of some of Saturn's outer satellites, such as Paaliaq, Hati, and S/2004 S13

I've seen a few of these small outer moons listed recently on the raw image page. They search tool only shows them from the last few orbits. Is this something new they are doing or have they been previously listed as Sky?

[Stu]

Just wondering... does anybody else live in a constant sense of amazement at the things we see now? I mean, every time we think we've seen the strangest of the strangest, the weirdest of the weird, the universe taps us on the shoulder and whispers "Pssst... look over there..." and we turn around and there's some gorram unbelievably freakish impossible new weirdest of the weird thing staring at us from the Black...

When I was young and saw my first pictures of Olympus Mons and Valles Marineris I thought they were the most amazing things I'd ever seen, or would see. In the years that followed I saw phlegmy volcanoes of bubbling sulphur on Io... the cracked frozen-coffee surface of Europa... Earth as a "pale blue dot" from the edge of the solar system... a "Death Star" orbiting Saturn... the "Pillars of Creation" through Hubble's eyes... the surface of Titan, the crumbling cliffs and steep slopes of a half mile wide crater blasted out of Mars, Earth as a "star" through a gap in Saturn's rings, the sun setting behind mountains on Barsoom, Europa rising up like a phantom from behind the limb of Jupiter, streamers and ribbons of blue flame inside then plume of a volcano vomiting out of Io...

... and now this, this tiny Saturnian moon of crackling ice and accumulated scrunching snow that looks like every UFO I ever drew on the covers of my school exercise books as a kid...

Seriously, I mean it, does anyone else ever just sit back from their screens, looking at these images, and think...

Unbelievable... just unbelievable...

[Bjorn Jonsson]

Just wondering... does anybody else live in a constant sense of amazement at the things we see now? I mean, every time we think we've seen the strangest of the strangest, the weirdest of the weird, the universe taps us on the shoulder and whispers "Pssst... look over there..." and we turn around and there's some gorram unbelievably freakish impossible new weirdest of the weird thing staring at us from the Black...

Well, I'm amazed and Cassini has been probably the best ever example of this.

A related observation: I'm amazed at just how different all of these satellites/solar system bodies (and not just those at Saturn) can be from each other, especially when they get reasonably big, say 250+ km in diameter (or length). In fact I probably cannot think of any two solar system bodies above that size that I would have even the slightest difficulties recognizing in global images (unless the resolution were really low). Somehow they each have their own 'personality'. Years ago people expected lots of 'Rheas' out there but instead you've got things like Enceladus, Iapetus, Hyperion and Dione which are totally different from each other (and Titan in a class of its own). The same is true at Jupiter, Uranus and Neptune. Every solar system object seems to be interesting in some way.