Jets of water ice particles spew from Saturn's moon Enceladus in this image obtained by NASA's Cassini spacecraft on August 13, 2010. A crescent of the moon appears dimly illuminated in front of the bright limb of Saturn.
This view looks toward the night side of Saturn, which occupies the lower half of the image. Enceladus, in the center of the image, is closer to the spacecraft than the planet is in this view. Sunlight scatters through the planet's atmosphere and forms the bright diagonal line running from the left to right of the image. Lit terrain seen on Enceladus (504 kilometers, 313 miles across) is on the leading hemisphere of the moon. North on Enceladus is up.
The jets erupting from the south polar region appear faint here, but can be seen at the bottom of the crescent of the moon. See PIA11688 to learn more.
The image was taken in visible light with the Cassini spacecraft wide-angle camera. The view was acquired at a distance of approximately 61,000 kilometers (38,000 miles) from Enceladus and at a Sun-Enceladus-spacecraft, or phase, angle of 155 degrees. Image scale is 4 kilometers (2 miles) per pixel.
Photo credit: NASA/JPL/Space Science Institute
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