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Target 1:
Rhea - with Robert
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Transcript for Target 1 Video
Hi, my name is Robert, I'm a science planning engineer.
Target #1 is a very nice view of Rhea. The image will be taken from a distance of nearly 260 thousand miles. Rhea has a diameter of about 950 miles which makes Saturn's second-largest moon and largest of the icy satellites.
Rhea is a so-called icy moon because it is composed primarily of water-ice. Rhea lacks any significant atmosphere, however scientists expect that Rhea has enough mass to hold a tenuous, or very thin atmosphere. Evidence of this has not been observed yet.
Like most other icy moons of Saturn, the surface of Rhea is heavily cratered. Image number two should also show a portion of Rhea's "whispy terrain" near the trailing hemisphere. This geologic feature is known to be a series of cracks and fractures due to past tectonic activity.
The Cassini spacecraft performed a 500km flyby of Rhea in November of 2005. Cassini will make its next and closest encouter of Rhea in March of 2010 at an altitude of only 60 miles! Until then, scientists can use images like Image #1 to possibly find evidence of a thin atmosphere and to look for changes in surface features.
So let's look at Rhea. Let's choose image number one.
+ Back to Target 1
