Tag Archives: probe

Cassini flyby

I’m a bit on the busy side in mundane meatspace at the moment. I’m in the process of planning a house-move back to my home town, and there’s nothing so torturous or frustrating as the bureaucratic sides of the tenant-landlord relationship, even (or seemingly especially) when you’re the sort of tenant who looks after the place where you’re living (because you’re treated by default as if you’re going to be one of the other sort). Still, all will surely resolve in due time, and I’ll be back in the real city that contains the imaginary city that my own blog was named for…

But I digress. In lieu of me pontificating on something topical, here’s a slice of pure sensawunda in the form of a composite video of Saturnian flybys. What’s extra-awesome about this is that those images aren’t CGI or artist’s impressions based on distant data; these are actual real images. Taken by a fuggin’ spaceship we built. A spaceship that has flown past fuggin’ Saturn.

Barber’s Adagio probably helps, but if watching that doesn’t give you a bit of a lump in the throat or a burn in the tearduct, I’m pretty sure you’re not really human.

Postcards from Enceladus

We interrupt our normal broadcasting to bring you… some space pr0n.

If you’re getting a bit worn down by the trouble and strife here on Earth (and who could blame you?), maybe you’ll get some refreshing respite from five minutes gawping at the landscape of the Saturnine moon Enceladus as captured by the Cassini probe:

landscape of the moon Enceladus

The above image [courtesy NASA/JPL/Space Science Institute] was taken from less than a thousand miles above Enceladus’ surface. Just think – in the space of a month we’ve confirmed water on Mars and seen the surface of a distant moon that may also have the potential to harbour life.

OK, back to the grind. Think about it too long, and it gets hard to come back to Earth…