Lunes, anneaux, ombres, nuages : Saturne
While cruising around Saturn,
be on the lookout for picturesque juxtapositions of moons, rings, and shadows.
One quite picturesque arrangement
occurred in 2005 and was captured by
the then Saturn-orbiting Cassini spacecraft.
In the featured image, moons
Tethys and
Mimas
are visible on either side of
Saturn's thin rings, which are seen nearly edge-on.
Across the top of
Saturn are dark
shadows of the wide rings,
exhibiting their impressive complexity.
The
violet-light image brings up the texture of the backdrop:
Saturn's clouds.
Cassini orbited Saturn
from 2004 until September of last year, when the
robotic spacecraft was directed to dive into Saturn to keep it from
contaminating any moons.