Spacecraft to Fly Through Geyser Plumes On Saturn Moon

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."

It really has the sensors for this?

[tmroyster]

It can really analyse the water samples? Wow, I'm impressed.

NASA really wants the probe to get a wash down.

Do they have windshield wipers?

[LiquidCoooled]

If they don't have wipers on their nice expensive spaceship isn't there a chance they could ruin the camera images with droplets and splattered bugs etc?

Re:Where's Google...?

[Corf]

This is pretty close [wikimedia.org]. On a related note, HOLY SHIT. I used to think orbital dynamics and the physics of space navigation were way over my head. Now, I realize they're way way way over my head. Does this thing even have thrusters of any kind, or did they shoot it into the sky, give it a push, and all this was planned out?

Hats off to the JPL nerds who made this work. I am floored.

Arthur C Clarke reference

[delibes]

In 2061 [wikipedia.org] (written over 20 years ago now) captain Smith fuels his spacecraft with water from Halley's comet and then flies through a geyser to clean the ship. The 'cosmic car wash manoeuvre' always struck me as crazily risky, but now it looks like someone at NASA thinks it's good clean fun :) Hopefully Cassini won't get too much of a blast at a distance of 50km.

Also, since there's hydrocarbons on Titan and ice in the rings and moons of Saturn, I think Clarke picked the wrong gas giant to send his characters to! Saturn's got it going on.

Re:Arthur C Clarke reference

[Drooling Iguana]

Clarke did pick Saturn. Kubrick changed it to Jupiter to make the special effects easier. The sequels to 2001 were written as sequels to the movie, not to the book.

Re:Where's Google...?

[isomeme]

Getting good data is hard, but good course planning is also hard. It's easy to find an orbit that will work; push an object sideways around a mass at any of a wide range of velocities, and voila, it's in an orbit.

What's hard -- and really as much an art as a science -- is taking the laws of orbital mechanics, the very restricted maneuvering-fuel budget, and several thousand science goals (often mutually excusive), and turning them into an efficient mission plan.

Then add to that dealing with the unexpected. The Cassini team had a whole orbital tour worked out before launch, then discovered while the probe was already en route to Saturn that they needed to completely change the orbital geometry for the Huygens probe's Titan descent to compensate for a radio design snafu. They succeeded in not only rejiggering nearly all the planned science to fit into a new orbital tour, but also in grabbing a few resulting new opportunities for observations along the changed route.

The best analogy I can think of is to the difference between generating a set of legal chess moves, and a set of good chess moves.

Re:Where's Google...?

[Tablizer]

needed to completely change the orbital geometry for the Huygens probe's Titan descent to compensate for a radio design snafu.

That's an amazing story in itself. The dude who discovered the problem did it on a hunch, barely got funding to check into the issue, and was almost ignored when he uncovered the problem. It would make a great "nerd drama" movie.