This is a fine piece a space engineering I must say. A trip of 7 years. I heard this morning that one of the moons of Saturn has an atmosphere similar to that of the earth. Maybe there are little saturn men (and women) out there …
The robotic invasion of our solar system is progressing nicely. For the last 7 years the Cassini spacecraft has been speeding towards Saturn, a 2 billion mile trek and today (6/30/04) it will zip through Saturn’s rings and orbit the planet. What will it do there? take pictures, send data back and invade the moon Titan with the Huygens probe. What are the tech specs on these space gadgets?
Cassini orbiter:
Launched Oct. 15, 1997.
22 feet long and weighs 12,593 pounds.
Power: Nuclear power.
Will orbit Saturn 76 times over four years.
Huygens probe:
Spacecraft is 8.9 feet in diameter and 705 pounds.
Will be released from Cassini on Dec. 24, 2004.
Will land on Titan’s atmosphere on Jan. 14, 2005.
Retail price:
$3.3 billion, shared by NASA, ESA, Italian Space Agency.
[Via Engadget]
