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Spacecraft to Fly Through Geyser Plumes On Saturn Moon

Posted by ryuzaki0 on from the fueling-station-coming-soon dept.

Riding with Robots writes "Today the robotic Saturn probe Cassini will make its closest buzz ever over the surface of the enigmatic ice moon Enceladus, whose surprising giant water geysers hint at a hidden ocean of liquid water. The spacecraft will fly right through the tops of the geyser plumes in order to sample the material that originated beneath the surface. NASA is offering a video, interactive guide and image gallery in advance of the event."

1 of 80 comments (clear)

  1. Weight restrictions and tradeoffs by StefanJ · · Score: 5, Funny

    Well, the initial plans called for wipers, but that would have required another .4 kg of expensive plutonium pellets in the RTG, and the added mass of the motor, intermittent-wipe controller, and the mechanism for changing spare wiper blades would have meant that the hermetically sealed capsule containing the Blob (frozen by Steve McQueen in the 1950s) would have been bumped to another deep-space probe.