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Iapetus and Enceladus: Baffling Moons of Saturn

"You could go so far as to call Iapetus pre-biotic. One of the reasons we are interested in the whole Saturnian system is the fact that it's kind of a laboratory for life. The molecules that lead to the origin of life on Earth, we think formed in the outer solar system, and we are seeing them in the Saturnian system. It's colder there and these complex molecules have persisted out there as kind of a laboratory for the origin of life."

- Bonnie Buratti, Ph.D., NASA/JPL Astronomer

 

Left: Black and white Iapetus (diameter 1,426 kilometers) with a bulging "weld" around its middle. Right: Enceladus (diameter 499 kilometers) is as bright as freshly fallen snow with a bizarre, wrinkled terrain. Below: Saturn and rings imaged by Cassini spacecraft in 2004. Images credit: NASA/JPL/Space Science Institute.
Above: Black and white Iapetus (diameter 1,426 kilometers) with a bulging "weld" around its middle. Below: Enceladus (diameter 499 kilometers) is as bright as freshly fallen snow with a bizarre, wrinkled terrain. Below: Saturn and rings imaged by Cassini spacecraft in 2004. Images credit: NASA/JPL/Space Science Institute.



February 17, 2005  Pasadena, California - The current NASA Cassini mission to Saturn has produced the clearest pictures human eyes have ever seen of Saturn's rings, which are made out of ice and dust and iron. In addition to the rings, Saturn has 33 moons, including Titan ­ Saturn's biggest moon and second largest moon in the Solar System after Jupiter's Ganymede. Beyond the mysterious Titan where methane apparently rains down into dark lakes, Cassini has also taken the clearest images of two other moons which baffle scientists. Those moons are Iapetus (eye-AP-uh-tus) and Enceladus (en-SELL-uh-dus) from Greek mythology. The entire Saturnian system is named from the Greek dramas about gods and the universe. Saturn was the Titan who ruled over the Olympian Gods, including Iapetus. Iapetus was the father of Atlas, who carried the Earth on his shoulders, and father of Prometheus who was mankind's savior. Saturn ended up killing his father, Uranus, to become lord of the Universe. After the murder, revenging giants sprang from the father's blood. One of those giants was called Enceladus.

 

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Sunspot Region 720 Emitted Strongest Solar Radiation Since October 1989

"It does look like the sun has been more active in the last 50 years than it has been for a long time. One estimate is that there has not been this long  a time period of high activity in something like 8,000 years."

- David Hathaway, Ph.D., NASA

Left: Giant sunspot 720 erupted for seventh time on Jan. 20, 2005, unleashing a powerful X 7-class solar flare. The blast hurled a coronal mass ejection (CME) into space and sparked the strongest radiation storm since October 1989. Jack Newton of Arizona photographed the sunspot rotating toward the sun's limb and other side on Jan. 19th. Right: Bright auroras spread across northern Europe on January 21st soon after 720's coronal mass ejection crashed into Earth's magnetic field. The result was a spectacular aurora display over Europe. Jim Henderson photographed the vivid red and yellow light near Aberdeen, Scotland.
Above: Giant sunspot 720 erupted for seventh time on Jan. 20, 2005, unleashing a powerful X 7-class solar flare. The blast hurled a coronal mass ejection (CME) into space and sparked the strongest radiation storm since October 1989. Jack Newton of Arizona photographed the sunspot rotating toward the sun's limb and other side on Jan. 19th. Below: Bright auroras spread across northern Europe on January 21st soon after 720's coronal mass ejection crashed into Earth's magnetic field. The result was a spectacular aurora display over Europe. Jim Henderson photographed the vivid red and yellow light near Aberdeen, Scotland. 


February 11, 2005  Huntsville, Alabama - On Saturday, January 15, the Sun erupted with three strong solar flares. The next day, the Sun erupted again. The Space Weather office at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) in Boulder, Colorado, released warnings about intense radiation storms that could damage satellites and interrupt radio communications. By Monday, January 17th, the Sun erupted yet again with a strong solar flare and some of the brightest auroras in years were being photographed over the northern latitudes. The next day there was yet another strong solar flare, totaling six major eruptions in four days.'

 

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Swarms of Earthquakes in Ecuador and the Nicobar and Andaman Islands – Is There A Connection?

"On January 27th, seismometers around the world were recording a quake every 20 minutes. ... I don't think we have ever seen this many magnitude 5 earthquakes concentrated in one location on the surface of the Earth, at least not in modern times." ­

Goran Ekstrom, Harvard Geophysicist

February 4, 2005  Cambridge, Massachusetts - Intense swarms of earthquakes, generally between 5 and 6 on the Richter Scale, began shaking the Nicobar and Andaman Islands north of Sumatra on January 26th. The next day, January 27th, seismometers around the world were recording an earthquake every 20 minutes. Indian Ocean residents and geophysicists began to wonder if it all was leading up to another large seismic event ­ even if the quakes were aftershocks of the huge 9.0 that occurred off the coast of Banda Aceh, Sumatra in Indonesia, on the morning of December 26, 2004. 

 

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Shroud of Turin Is Between 1,300 and 3,000 Years Old, Based On New Chemistry Evidence

The Shroud of Turin: modern photo of the face, positive left and digitally processed image right.
The Shroud of Turin: modern photo of the face, positive left and digitally processed image right.
Left top is front negative image on Shroud of Turin; Right top is back negative image on Shroud. Left below is front positive image on Shroud of Turin; Right below is back positive image on Shroud.
Left top is front negative image on Shroud of Turin; Right top is back negative image on Shroud. Left below is front positive image on Shroud of Turin; Right below is back positive image on Shroud.
The Shroud is a linen cloth that for centuries has been purported to be the burial shroud of Jesus Christ. The linen measures 14 feet 3 inches long and 3 feet 7 inches wide . There are two faint brownish-yellow images, those of the back and front of a 5-foot 7-inch man. The Shroud has been preserved since 1694 in the royal chapel of the Cathedral of San Giovanni Battista in Turin, Italy. Positive and negative photographs were taken in 1898 by Secondo Pia.
The Shroud is a linen cloth that for centuries has been purported to be the burial shroud of Jesus Christ. The linen measures 14 feet 3 inches long and 3 feet 7 inches wide . There are two faint brownish-yellow images, those of the back and front of a 5-foot 7-inch man. The Shroud has been preserved since 1694 in the royal chapel of the Cathedral of San Giovanni Battista in Turin, Italy. Positive and negative photographs were taken in 1898 by Secondo Pia.

January 27, 2005  Los Alamos, New Mexico - The Shroud of Turin is a linen cloth alleged to be the burial shroud of Christ. It has pale brownish-yellow stains front and back that form the image of a man as if the linen had been wrapped around the body from the feet up over the head and back down to the feet, leaving complete front and back images. There are also many reddish-colored bloodstains that indicate the man was repeatedly whipped and there are rivulets of blood on the face and back of the head. Many people believe the linen was used to wrap Christ's body after his crucifixion on the cross approximately 2,000 years ago.

 

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Mega-Tsunami Threat of the Cumbre Vieja Volcano in Canary Islands

Satellite photo of 4-mile-high Cumbre Vieja, La Palma, Canary Islands, (Spain) volcano, west of La' Youn, Morocco, Africa. Three miles of the volcano are below the surface of the Atlantic Ocean; just over one mile is above the surface. Image courtesy of the Image Analysis Laboratory, NASA Johnson Space Center.
Satellite photo of 4-mile-high Cumbre Vieja, La Palma, Canary Islands, (Spain) volcano, west of La' Youn, Morocco, Africa. Three miles of the volcano are below the surface of the Atlantic Ocean; just over one mile is above the surface. Image courtesy of the Image Analysis Laboratory, NASA Johnson Space Center.

January 21, 2005  Santa Cruz, California - The seven Canary Islands owned by Spain rise above the Atlantic Ocean west of Morocco, Africa. One of them, La Palma, is not only the steepest island in the world, but has also been the most volcanically active of the Canaries in the past 500 years. On it is the 4-mile high volcano called Cumbre Vieja, which means "Old Summit." The volcano has been re-building itself for the past 15,000 years since it last blew apart and collapsed huge amounts of rock into the surrounding ocean, sending out a giant tsunami that has been detected in deposits as far away as the Bahamas and Bermuda. Over the past 15,000 years, the volcano kept erupting under water, building back up from the Atlantic sea bed three miles below the water surface to its present height, which is now more than a mile above the Atlantic. Its last two eruptions were 1971 and 1949.

 

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Titan – A Moon Where It Rains Methane Into Seas and Soils of Hydrocarbons

Above: Ringed Saturn has 33 moons reported as of August, 2004. Below: Titan is Saturn's biggest moon and second largest moon in the Solar System (after Jupiter's Ganymede). It is larger than the planets, Mercury and Pluto. Titan has a thick atmosphere (mostly nitrogen with some methane) and an atmospheric pressure of 1.6 bars (60 percent greater than the Earth's). This atmosphere with its heavy clouds obscures the moon's surface. It may rain liquid methane. The surface temperature is about -178°C = -289°F. Images courtesy NASA/JPL.
Left: Ringed Saturn has 33 moons reported as of August, 2004. Right: Titan is Saturn's biggest moon and second largest moon in the Solar System (after Jupiter's Ganymede). It is larger than the planets, Mercury and Pluto. Titan has a thick atmosphere (mostly nitrogen with some methane) and an atmospheric pressure of 1.6 bars (60 percent greater than the Earth's). This atmosphere with its heavy clouds obscures the moon's surface. It may rain liquid methane. The surface temperature is about -178°C = -289°F. Images courtesy NASA/JPL.
Earth-looking "river" system that is now assumed to drain methane from methane rains into methane seas on Saturn's huge, mysterious moon, Titan. Photograph courtesy European Space Agency (ESA).
Earth-looking "river" system that is now assumed to drain methane from methane rains into methane seas on Saturn's huge, mysterious moon, Titan. Photograph courtesy European Space Agency (ESA).

January 21, 2005  Tucson, Arizona - On January 14, 2005, the European Space Agency's (ESA) Huygens probe finally landed on the surface of Saturn's mysterious and cloud-covered moon, Titan. ESA engineers said Huygens is "the furthest human-made object that has touched down on an alien world, the only moon in the solar system with a thick atmosphere." Titan is Saturn's largest moon of at least 33 moons counted so far and is larger than the planets, Mercury and Pluto. As the Huygens probe fell by parachute through the strange moon's atmosphere at speeds ranging from 150 meters per second down to 5 meters per second, earth scientists were surprised that the probe kept losing orientation lock on the sun. Later it was decided that the lock problem and whooshing sounds from the probe's microphone were caused by winds on the moon that buffeted Huygens as it descended. That means Titan even has weather.

 

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Updated – Cassini/Huygen’s First Look At Titan’s Surface

January 14, 2005  Darmstadt, Germany - European Space Agency scientists celebrated today after the first raw images of the Cassini/Huygen space probe sent back the first images of Saturn's moon, Titan, which has been shrouded by thick atmosphere until now.

ESOC's Main Control Room (MCR) at 14:12 CET, 14 January 2005, as flight control staff wait for first data from Huygens probe as it descended to Titan's surface.
ESOC's Main Control Room (MCR) at 14:12 CET, 14 January 2005, as flight control staff wait for first data from Huygens probe as it descended to Titan's surface.
Composite of Titan's surface seen during descent on January 14, 2005.
Composite of Titan's surface seen during descent on January 14, 2005.

 

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NASA “Deep Space” Craft Will Hit Comet On July 4, 2005

Left: Deep Impact lifted off at 1:47:08.574 PM ET from pad 17-B at Cape Canaveral Air Force Station, Florida, bound for Comet Tempel 1. Image courtesy NASA. Right: Arrow points to Comet Tempel 1 photographed on December 11, 2004, by Observatorio de Begues, Spain. The plan is to blow a hole in the comet on July 4, 2005, to see what it's made of. Image from Observatorio de Begues.
Left: Deep Impact lifted off at 1:47:08.574 PM ET from pad 17-B at Cape Canaveral Air Force Station, Florida, bound for Comet Tempel 1. Image courtesy NASA. Right: Arrow points to Comet Tempel 1 photographed on December 11, 2004, by Observatorio de Begues, Spain. The plan is to blow a hole in the comet on July 4, 2005, to see what it's made of. Image from Observatorio de Begues.

January 13, 2005  Cape Canaveral, Florida - Yesterday, scientists were gathered at the Cape Canaveral Air Force Station in Florida to watch the lift off of humankind's very first effort to physically look inside a comet in our solar system. The spacecraft is called "Deep Impact." It's goal is to create some icy fireworks on July 4th this year when it literally blows a hole in a 5-mile-diameter comet named Tempel 1.

 

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9.0 Sumatra Earthquake Update

Red bullseye south of Meulaboh and Banda Aceh, island of Sumatra, Indonesia, indicates 9.0 Richter Scale earthquake's epicenter at 8 a.m. Sumatra time on December 26, 2004. The tsunami of a trillion cubic meters of water swamped beaches, including Phuket and the Nicobar and Andaman Islands northwest of Banda Aceh. Yet animals and natives on those nearby islands apparently got to higher ground to survive.
Red bullseye south of Meulaboh and Banda Aceh, island of Sumatra, Indonesia, indicates 9.0 Richter Scale earthquake's epicenter at 8 a.m. Sumatra time on December 26, 2004. The tsunami of a trillion cubic meters of water swamped beaches, including Phuket and the Nicobar and Andaman Islands northwest of Banda Aceh. Yet animals and natives on those nearby islands apparently got to higher ground to survive.

January 7, 2005  Pasadena, California - The 9.0 Indian Ocean earthquake that hit Sumatra, Indonesia, at 8 o'clock Christmas morning was caused by big rocky plates moving over each other more than five miles down at the bottom of the Indian Ocean. Those big chunks of rock were at least 500 kilometers by 150 kilometers wide. That is 311 miles by 93 miles. The Burma Plate slid fifty feet closer to India. Normally the Indian plate has moved only 2.4 inches a year.

 

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