Media Information

 
 
 
Collection:
NASA Cassini-Huygens Collection
Title:
Rhea Releases Enceladus
Description:
Two slim crescents smile toward the Cassini spacecraft following an occultation event.
Full Description:
Two slim crescents smile toward the Cassini spacecraft following an occultation event.

Taken only five minutes after Enceladus (505 kilometers, or 314 miles across) first approached the limb of Rhea (1,528 kilometers, or 949 miles across), this view shows the bright little moon emerging from behind the larger moon's crescent. (See Enceladus Approaches for the earlier view.)

The image was taken in visible light with the Cassini spacecraft narrow-angle camera on July 4, 2006 at a distance of approximately 1.4 million kilometers (800,000 miles) from Rhea and 1.9 million kilometers (1.2 million miles) from Enceladus. The view was obtained at a Sun-moon-spacecraft, or phase, angle of about 142 degrees relative to both moons. Image scale is 8 kilometers (5 miles) per pixel on Rhea and 11 kilometers (7 miles) on Enceladus.

The Cassini-Huygens mission is a cooperative project of NASA, the European Space Agency and the Italian Space Agency. The Jet Propulsion Laboratory, a division of the California Institute of Technology in Pasadena, manages the mission for NASA's Science Mission Directorate, Washington, D.C. The Cassini orbiter and its two onboard cameras were designed, developed and assembled at JPL. The imaging operations center is based at the Space Science Institute in Boulder, Colo.

For more information about the Cassini-Huygens mission visit http://saturn.jpl.n…. The Cassini imaging team homepage is at http://ciclops.org.

*Credit:* NASA/JPL/Space Science Institute
Date:
August 7, 2006
Keywords:
Rhea
Keywords:
Enceladus
Keywords:
occultation
facet_what:
Saturn
facet_what:
Cassini
facet_what:
Cassini-Huygens
facet_what:
Huygens Probe
facet_what:
Moon
facet_what:
Cassini Orbiter
facet_what:
Rhea
facet_what:
Sun
facet_what:
Visible Light
facet_what:
Enceladus
facet_where:
Saturn
facet_where:
Jet Propulsion Laboratory
facet_where:
California
facet_where:
Washington
facet_where:
Rhea
facet_where:
Enceladus
facet_where:
Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL)
facet_where:
Washington, D.C.
facet_when:
July 4, 2006
facet_when:
August 7, 2006
facet_when_year:
2006
UID:
SPD-SATRN-2226
original url:

Rhea Releases Enceladus