Starship Asterisk*

Thanks for your help geckzilla, which is much appreciated. :)

When I read the email notifying me that there had been a new post to a thread that I was interested in I was quite surprised to see that the thread was from 2010! It's almost like astroarchaeology (if there is such a word :P ) in finding the answer! As owlice states, it is "Excellent sleuthing". :thumb_up:

Yay, geckzilla!!! Excellent sleuthing; thank you!! :clap:

[quote="DavidLeodis"]There are what I assume are 2 moons of Saturn visible. I would be grateful if someone could name them, if that is possible to know from the image. :?: Thanks. :)[/quote]
Owlice asked me this tonight and I dug until I found the exact time and day of the exposures. 2005 Feb 28th 16:49 UTC. From there you can use Solar System Simulator to find out which moons were in that spot at that time.
http://space.jpl.nasa.gov/
With the right parameters, you get this.
[attachment=0]satsim_apod_investigation.jpg[/attachment]

It's Dione and Enceladus. I posted a bit longer explanation on my quest for the answers [url=http://www.unmannedspaceflight.com/index.php?showtopic=7875]here[/url].

[quote="APOD Robot"][url=http://apod.nasa.gov/apod/ap100215.html][img]http://apod.nasa.gov/apod/calendar/S_100215.jpg[/img] [size=150]Cassini Spacecraft Crosses Saturn's Ring Plane[/size][/url]

[b] Explanation: [/b] If this is Saturn, where are the rings? ...[/quote]

[img]http://www.popham.org.uk/flint/bambam.jpg[/img]

Thanks neufer. I thought it would be unlikely that the moons could be named with certainty. I guess they will be 2 of the large moons near Saturn.

[quote="DavidLeodis"]There are what I assume are 2 moons of Saturn visible. I would be grateful if someone could name them, if that is possible to know from the image. :?: Thanks. :)[/quote]
[size=150][b]The usual suspects:[/b][/size]
[img]http://www2.jpl.nasa.gov/saturn/gif/ring_sat1.gif[/img]
[b] http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GqwUpABqYBo[/b]

There are what I assume are 2 moons of Saturn visible. I would be grateful if someone could name them, if that is possible to know from the image. :?: Thanks. :)

[quote="bdb_raclub"]Please look again, we do see the rings' shadows on the upper half of the iimage. They are consistent with the angle of the terminator on the planet. Saturn is around equnox now but not when Casini made the image in 2005. Casini does not have to wait for equinox to cross the ring plane and get an edge-on view.[/quote]
We can see the rings' shadows, when they are present. The picture shown was taken in 2005 and the shadows are plainly visible, but LH's point was, since Saturn has just passed equinox, the shadows shouldn't be that visible now. The confusion was in the original wording of the explanation, which made it seem like the picture was taken this month.

Please look again, we do see the rings' shadows on the upper half of the iimage. They are consistent with the angle of the terminator on the planet. Saturn is around equnox now but not when Casini made the image in 2005. Casini does not have to wait for equinox to cross the ring plane and get an edge-on view.

Thanks! Now I understand. /LH

Two typos corrected. Try it now. - RJN

:?: The horizontal blue line would be the rings edge-on then :?:

Why put a photo of the rings, taken in February, together with a background of Saturn taken in 2005? Very confusing, especially since it's pointed out that it could not look like it does in the picture.

[url=http://apod.nasa.gov/apod/ap100215.html][img]http://apod.nasa.gov/apod/calendar/S_100215.jpg[/img] [size=150]Cassini Spacecraft Crosses Saturn's Ring Plane[/size][/url]

[b] Explanation: [/b] If this is Saturn, where are the rings? When Saturn's "appendages" [url=http://www2.jpl.nasa.gov/saturn/back.html]disappeared[/url] in 1612, [url=http://www-groups.dcs.st-and.ac.uk/~history/Mathematicians/Galileo.html]Galileo[/url] did not understand why. Later that century, it became understood that [url=http://www.nineplanets.org/saturn.html]Saturn[/url]'s unusual protrusions were rings and that when the [url=http://apod.nasa.gov/apod/ap950801.html]Earth crosses the ring plane[/url], the edge-on rings will appear to disappear. This is because Saturn's rings are confined to a [url=http://coolcosmos.ipac.caltech.edu/cosmic_kids/AskKids/saturnrings.shtml]plane many times thinner[/url], in proportion, than a [url=http://www.quikshave.com/timeline.htm]razor blade[/url]. In modern times, the [url=http://saturn.jpl.nasa.gov/overview/mission.cfm]robot Cassini spacecraft[/url] orbiting Saturn now also crosses [url=http://apod.nasa.gov/apod/ap040117.html]Saturn's ring[/url] plane. A series of plane crossing images from late 2005 February was dug out of the vast [url=http://saturn.jpl.nasa.gov/multimedia/images/raw/index.cfm]online Cassini raw image[/url] archive by interested Spanish amateur Fernando Garcia Navarro. [url=http://ciclops.org/view/774/Splendid_Saturn]Pictured above[/url], digitally cropped and set in representative colors, is the striking result. [url=http://apod.nasa.gov/apod/ap080720.html]Saturn's thin ring plane[/url] appears in blue, bands and clouds in [url=http://apod.nasa.gov/apod/ap041102.html]Saturn's upper atmosphere[/url] appear in gold. Since Saturn just [url=http://apod.nasa.gov/apod/ap091110.html]passed its equinox[/url], today the ring plane is pointed close to the Sun and the rings could not cast the high [url=http://apod.nasa.gov/apod/ap090901.html]dark shadows[/url] seen across the top of this image, taken back in 2005. Moons appear as bumps in the rings.

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