Europa, Titan, & other deep space sites, Gas giants Saturn, Jupiter, et al, Space Systems

Video: A 360-degree view of Cassini diving between Saturn and the rings

This interactive video from NASA JPL allows you to scan Saturn and the rings as the Cassini spacecraft makes one of its dives between the two before the Grand Finale in September.

Dive between Saturn and its rings with NASA’s Cassini spacecraft in the final chapter of its mission. In this 360-degree video, you are traveling along with the spacecraft at tens of thousands of miles per hour as it makes one of 22 planned dives through this unexplored gap. The first dive of Cassini’s Grand Finale takes place on April 26, 2017, with additional dives about once a week. 

Key Dates
  • April 22: Titan 126 Flyby at 6:08 a.m. UTC (11:08 p.m. PDT on April 21)
  • April 23: First Grand Finale Orbit Begins at 3:46 a.m. UTC (8:46 p.m. PDT on April 22)
  • April 26: First Ringplane Crossing at 9 a.m. UTC (2 a.m. PDT)
  • May 24: Northern Summer Solstice Begins
  • Sept. 15: Cassini’s Final Entry into Saturn’s Atmosphere begins at 10:44 a.m. UTC (3:44 a.m. PDT). Spacecraft loss of signal comes one minute later at 10:45 a.m. UTC (3:45 a.m. PDT).
  • Sept. 15: Final signal received on Earth at 12:08 p.m. UTC (5:08 a.m. PDT)

See also these other recent Cassini posts:

Here is a view of Earth and the Moon as seen recently by Cassini through the rings: NASA Image Shows Earth Between the Rings of Saturn | NASA

This cropped, zoomed-in version of the image makes it easier to see Earth’s moon — a smaller, fainter dot to the left of our planet’s bright dot. Credits: NASA/JPL-Caltech/Space Science Institute Full image and caption

Here is a new video of Saturn’s hexagon north pole using Cassini images: Cassini: Mission to Saturn: Saturn’s Hexagon in Motion

North pole of Saturn made from Cassini images. Different wavelengths of light from ultraviolet to visible to infrared have been assigned colors.

The gray scale version:

The black and white version.

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