Cassini Sends Final Images as It Plunges Toward Saturn

[Zorro]

Source: New York Times



The last picture show from Saturn has begun.

The final photographs taken by NASA’s Cassini spacecraft are streaming back to Earth. Early Friday morning, the last of the last will arrive. They include some of the favorite subjects over Cassini’s 13-year stay in orbit: the rings, the moons Enceladus and Titan, and Saturn itself.

One image yet to arrive will be the spot where Cassini will disintegrate on Friday, by deliberate design. The spacecraft is accelerating to its end as it dips a bit deeper into Saturn’s atmosphere.

High above the cloud tops, the atmosphere is still thin, nearly a vacuum. “The analog of that on Earth might be where the International Space Station is,” Earl Maize, Cassini’s project manager, said at a news conference on Wednesday.

Read more: https://www.nytimes.com/2017/09/14/science/cassini-grand-finale-saturn.html

[alfredo]

1. Goodbye old friend.

[burrowowl]

2. Thank you Cassini, RIP!

[longship]

3. Oh dear. Somebody's chopping onions.

Carolyn Porco and Linda Spilker and the rest of the team who helped usher Cassini/Huygens to its phenomenal successes must be sad today.

As of the last photos received, Carolyn's job is closing down, after three decades.

The analysis of the data will continue for decades.

But the mission is over today.

[rtracey]

16. well

Well, It was a great run and to me what I think is an important aspect of this is after 30 years (3 decades) they retained their jobs for this mission. After all the political BS this country went through in 30 year, after all the cuts, layoffs, firings, quitings, etc, they were able to stay on mission.... to me that is the incredible part, which tells us NASA is pretty high up in priority for our country. EVERYONE loves the astronauts.

[hibbing]

4. Going out in a blaze of glory

I'll have to hit the NASA site to see for others. Thanks for posting this.

Peace

[Bernardo de La Paz]

11. NASA final orbits Cassini website link

https://www.nasa.gov/press-release/cassini-spacecraft-makes-its-final-approach-to-saturn

[pokerfan]

5. Poor little probe

Reminds me of the Spirit Rover...

[calimary]

6. Awww...

Giving one's life for science. Little machines and big sacrifices.

[renate]

8. oh that's so sad.... :( :( :(

The one thing that's cheering at the end of these missions is the sheer beauty of humanity's curiosity and our drive to learn for the sake of learning.

But gosh I'm sad that this mission is ending.

[Rhiannon12866]

9. He was my favorite, too...

And that is as sad as it gets...

[eggplant]

7. As a friend said...

That'll do, probe. That'll do.

[BumRushDaShow]

10. Based on this from the OP link, it is now gone

<...>

Cassini’s radio transmissions will disappear at 7:55 a.m. Eastern time, according to calculations by NASA engineers. The time of death at Saturn will actually have been one hour, 23 minutes earlier, but that is the time it takes the signals, moving at the speed of light, to travel the 1 billion miles that currently separate Saturn and Earth, picked up by radio telescopes in Australia and then sent to NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory here.

and acknowledgement of it would happen at 7:55 am ET.

[Girard442]

12. Although it probably didn't vocalize it, Cassini's last directive was...

..."Must...sterilize."

[paleotn]

13. exactly.

[paleotn]

14. .........

ALL THESE WORLDS ARE YOURS—EXCEPT ̶E̶U̶R̶O̶P̶A̶ ENCELADUS
ATTEMPT NO LANDING THERE.

[justhanginon]

15. Cassinni's probably feeling that after all the the info and pictures

I sent you guys for all this time and now this? I feel so used!

[Javaman]

17. It's final message...

"give my wife my love"... then nothing more.

[Ghost Dog]

18. Signal Lost. Cassini has now disintegrated.

[demmiblue]

19. Mission Completed

Link to tweet

[lastlib]

20. Farewell, Cassini--and we thank you!

. . . . . . . . .

[LonghornJack]

21. Well Done, Cassini

Lastlib, you took the words right off my keyboard.

Well done, our fine friend Cassini, and we thank you.

LHJ

[Calista241]

22. Some of the best $3.6b ever spent by our government. n/t