As many of you know, I work on the Cassini mission as an operations engineer and have done for over a decade.
Tomorrow is the spacecraft’s final close flyby (T126) of Saturn’s moon Titan.
Just to put this into perspective for you, this may be the last time in decades that we get anywhere near Titan. There are no missions to Saturn or its most interesting* moons, Titan and Enceladus, currently funded or being built. That means there’s a minimum of ten years before a new mission could be launched. Given that the transit time to Saturn is, at a minimum, seven years and on average more like ten, that’s two decades until we can repeat Cassini’s observations.
Cassini’s impending demise makes me sad, of course, but what bothers me even more is the lack of continuity in our exploration of our solar system.
You can read the details of tomorrow’s Cassini’s observations on the NASA-JPL press release here. It includes an animation of the flyby over the surface, from the perspective of the spacecraft.
* “most interesting” being ever so slightly subjective, of course
Tomorrow is the spacecraft’s final close flyby (T126) of Saturn’s moon Titan.
Just to put this into perspective for you, this may be the last time in decades that we get anywhere near Titan. There are no missions to Saturn or its most interesting* moons, Titan and Enceladus, currently funded or being built. That means there’s a minimum of ten years before a new mission could be launched. Given that the transit time to Saturn is, at a minimum, seven years and on average more like ten, that’s two decades until we can repeat Cassini’s observations.
Cassini’s impending demise makes me sad, of course, but what bothers me even more is the lack of continuity in our exploration of our solar system.
You can read the details of tomorrow’s Cassini’s observations on the NASA-JPL press release here. It includes an animation of the flyby over the surface, from the perspective of the spacecraft.
* “most interesting” being ever so slightly subjective, of course
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Poor old Rico Dredd is going to be stuck there for AGES then...
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It's also infuriating. I have read opinions about the money being wasted on space exploration when it should be spent on healthcare, poverty, education, etc. and thought there is a point there (not one I agree with entirely, because any research can yield unexpectedly useful results even if you don't believe that humans need dreams and aspirations). And then where does the funding go instead? Bombs. Wars. Poisoning the planet. Jollies for rich people who could well pay for themselves.
But at least we have the beautiful and inspiring photos and data from Cassini et al. Thank you and everyone who work on it for that.
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This. 1,000,000% this.
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I'm very happy to have contributed, in my small way, to the achievements of Cassini.
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And yeah, it takes so very long to do stuff in space. I remember colleagues going out for maternity/paternity leave. Those kids are now in college... Your wee ones will be grown before there's another Saturn visit. How... odd.
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It is, isn't it? I was pleasantly surprised by that.
Yes. And yet working on these long-time-scale missions also makes it seem not too far off. I'm still wrapping my head around the idea that it was over five years ago when JUICE was still entirely an unfunded paper mission.
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But thank you for helping us learn more about the Sol system.
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OTOH, I can see how orbiting Titan would be made difficult by Saturn perturbing it rather.
But.. well, aren't we then just contaminating Saturn?
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Yes, there's no getting round the fact that Cassini's crash will contaminate Saturn, but the ratio of radioactive isotopes to atmospheric particles on Saturn is negligible compared to what it would be on Titan.
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Thanks for the link.
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[LEANS OUT OF WINDOW] By-bye Titan!
[READS ARTICLE] It says they're using a magicometer to examine Titan's pointy hat! [BOUNCE, BOUNCE] We may soon have proof of the existence of Giant Space Wizards! =:o]
Any guesses what we'll get from the dives between Saturn's rings and the atmosphere? (Besides lots of really cool animations, obviously. =:o} )
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"What the...? Lizards! We told them to look for giant space *lizards*!!!"
=:o}
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Hopefully some better information about Saturn's interior, particularly the core. Also, nailing down how long a day is on Saturn would be quite nice.
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I'm guessing "too long to have to put up with *this* kind of weather!". =:o}
My mind goes bendy trying to even vaguely conjecture what the dynamics of an atmosphere way deeper than the radius of the solid thingie that's spinning inside it would be like, or even if the spinning thingie would even be a relevant factor in the behaviour of the upper (visible to us) layers of atmosphere at all. (But fortunately, no one's relying on me to figure it out!)
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Oh yeah. You don't have to remind me. :P I'm one of the people who has to make sure that data keeps coming in and looks right.
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I have an LJ/FB friend who works at NASA in Houston.
I just saw the Google Doodle for April 26th, too.
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It must be so frustrating to know that a lot of knowledge and time is inevitably lost when, as you say, there is no continuity in the exploration missions planned and in progress.
Hope there is some sort of righteous champagne-popping, nibble-eating event to celebrate and toast the mission's conclusion.
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I loved the Google Doodle.
Oh, there will be more than one righteous champagne-popping nibble-eating event to celebrate the end of mission. :D