TWIRLING! Twirling toward TITAN!

[Ediacara]

This picture is a composite of 30 images from ESA's Huygens
probe. They were taken from an altitude varying from 13
kilometers down to 8 kilometers when the probe was descending
towards its landing site.

The images have a resolution of about 20 meters per pixel and
cover an area extending out to 30 kilometers.

And a choppy "animation" of the descent:

http://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/cassini/multimedia/pia07234.html

As well as a best guess of where Huygens landed:


A view of Huygens' probable landing site based on initial,
best-guess estimates. Scientists on the Huygens Descent Imager/
Spectral Radiometer (DISR) science team are still working
to refine the exact location of the probe's landing site,
but they estimate that it lies within the white circle shown
in this image.

The Descent Imager/Spectral Radiometer is one of two NASA
instruments on the probe.

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 Cassini-
Huygens 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
Descent Imager/Spectral team is based at the University of
Arizona, Tucson, Ariz.

ON EDIT: To add captions.

[GreenPartyVoter]

1. Cool!

-----------------------------------------------------------
Save this nation one town, county, and state at a time!
http://timeforachange.bluelemur.com/electionreform.htm#why

[ET Awful]

2. We must go forward, not backward

upward, not forward, and always twirling, twirling, twirling towards freedom.

[Ediacara]

3. Twirling toward TITAN

Jeez Kodos....

[myrna minx]

4. Thanks for these photos.

The images of Titan give me goosebumps, but alas, I am a nerd. I even have my own el cheapo telescope. :-)

[Commie Pinko Dirtbag]

6. The sentence "I am a nerd" should NEVER be preceded by "Alas"!

Precede it with HELL YEAH!

[eyepaddle]

5. Don't blame me--I voted for Kang!

Nice work DinoBoy!

It certainly looks like a wave dominated river delta in the lower left, emptying into the dark "basin."

What do you think? Is that one of Titan's ethane lakes with either clouds or islands? (In the centerand right of picture) As long as we're here--are the features in the dark area photo defects, or actual surface features?

[Ediacara]

7. Yes, looks like a delta to me :-)

I am not sure what to make of the dark basin. NASA seems to be implying they landed on the shoreline of something. But the landing area's photo seems to imply that they landed in the dark stripe near the white features in the "NW" corner of the spiral image. Maybe the dark basin is a "muddy" basin where meteoric liquid drains into the subsurface, but then again, that really looks like a delta with wave action, and possibly, long-shore drift towards the NW. Do you have a better idea where the landing sight could be in the big spiral image?

As for the white splotchy features, I have no idea what to make of them. Possibly clouds, possibly islands, possibly even "snow" drifts rafting or blowing across the basin.

I want more pictures damnit :-)

[eyepaddle]

9. Maybe on Titan they could use

an inanimate carbon rod! (That episode of the Simpsons was just on here)

I am unsure of the geographic orientation of the spiral set of pics, but yes, The "NW" does seem to be the highlighted landing area. I think it'll take some topographic data to really answer what those sreakey looking features on the basin are, but I believe Cassini CAN do some radar mapping. I'll have to take a closer look to see the long shore drift. If that Delta were buliding out into a "muddy" or slushy basin wouldn't it be more likely to be a birdfoot delta ala The Mississippi reiver's delta?

I want more pictures AND more data! Do any of your prof's have any connections to JPL or other planetary geologists?

All I know is, the closer we (all humans) look at the solar system the more amazing it becomes. :)

and :kick:

ON EDIT" Yeah that really does look like longshore drift moving to the the northwest

[Ediacara]

8. kick

:kick: :kick: :kick: :kick: :kick: :kick: :kick: :kick: :kick: :kick: :kick: :kick: :kick: :kick: :kick: :kick: :kick: :kick: :kick: :kick: :kick: :kick: :kick: :kick: :kick: :kick: :kick: :kick: