Saturn with Moons

Saturn with Moons
December 17, 2004
PIA NumberPIA01383
Language
  • english

Saturn and its satellites Tethys (outer left), Enceladus (inner left) and
Mimas (right of rings) are seen in this mosaic of images taken by NASA's
Voyager 1 on Oct. 30, 1980, from a distance of 18 million kilometers (11
million miles). The soft, velvety appearance of the low-contrast banded
structure and increased reflection of blue light near the perimeter of the
Saturn disk are due to scattering by a haze layer above the planet's cloud
deck. Features larger than 350 kilometers (220 miles) are visible. The
projected width of the rings at the center of the disk is 10,000
kilometers (6,000 miles), which provides a scale for estimating feature
sizes on the image.


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