Dione

The Cassini spacecraft examines the anti-Saturnian side of Dione and shows the cratered surface east of the moon's distinctive wispy terrain.

The wispy terrain, which consists of bright cliffs on the moon's trailing hemisphere, can just barely be seen on the limb of the moon on the left of the image. North on Dione (698 miles, or 1,123 kilometers across) is up. See PIA12608 for a better view of the wisps. See PIA07769 for more southern view of Dione presented in dramatic false colors.

This view looks toward the northern, sunlit side of the rings from just above the ringplane.

The image was taken in visible light with the Cassini spacecraft narrow-angle camera on October 2, 2011. The view was obtained at a distance of approximately 174,000 miles (280,000 kilometers) from Dione and at a Sun-Dione-spacecraft, or phase, angle of 11 degrees. Image scale is 2 miles (3 kilometers) per pixel.

Photo credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/Space Science Institute