Oh MAN I can't believe I forgot about this in the steamy nightclubs of Orlando. They did it! The Huygens probe landed on Titan! Go ESA!
There are rocks. Rocks! Pebbles, or methane, or water ice, or something, they're still analyzing the photos. We couldn't see through the atmosphere with telescopes, so the probe has shown us some amazing things. Drainage channels, a possible shoreline, and liquid seas of methane and other hydrocarbons?! This is a BIG deal, people. I won't even go into the aerodynamic complexities of designing parachutes for an atmosphere we could only speculate about. But I'm so excited! Titan is Saturn's largest moon and the only moon in the solar system with a significant atmosphere (even Mars has less than 1% of Earth's atmosphere). In fact, of bodies the size of Earth, its only competitor is Venus, whose surface temperature is 900 degrees Fahrenheit, hot enough to melt lead (not to mention the intense surface pressure crushed Soviet probes within seconds). Contrast that with Titan's surface temp of -292 F. Kinda makes you happy to be on Earth, huh? At least here the oceans are water and not supercold "paint thinner." Still, science fiction springs to mind, with future explorers making pitstops at Titan to refuel their rockets from oceans of cryogenic methane.
Some sites to check out include the Cassini mission homepage at JPL and of course news sites like cnn. There's even a blog by a cnn reporter. I love it when journalists get as sappy as I do.
And as a post script to my previous entry, check out this study of consciousness and faith...they even talk about world peace, fundamentalism, and the failure to abandon beliefs in the face of irrefutable logic. Awesome!
Posted by George at January 17, 2005 01:50 AMyay for space exploration! and yeah, that journalist's blog you linked to was very cool... he touched on interesting distinction b/w ESA and NASA--namely the generous sharing of images or lack thereof. i suppose cultural differences persist, even in outer space. :) anyway, as usual, thanks for sharing the joy, your spaceness.
Posted by: nas at January 17, 2005 08:33 PMhave to laud you on the OG batman series reference there...BIFF! POW! SMACK! George ROCKS!
Posted by: Navs at January 17, 2005 10:26 PM