Graphic of jets of high-density gas detected by Cassini on Enceladus
Photojournal: PIA10355
Published: March 26, 2008

Jets of high-density gas detected by Cassini's Ultraviolet Imaging Spectrograph on Saturn's moon Enceladus match the locations of dust jets determined from Cassini images, labeled here with Roman numerals. The spectrograph pinpointed the locations of individual gas streams in the plume in a "stellar occultation," which involves measuring the light of a star (in this case, zeta Orionis), as it passed behind the plume from Cassini's viewpoint.


Some of the dust jets appear to merge together in stellar occultation data. The dimming of starlight labeled "a" was caused by dust jets V and VII. The dimming of starlight marked as feature "b" may be associated with dust jet I if the jet is not perfectly vertical. Dimming of starlight labeled "c" corresponds to dust jet VI, and "d" is dust jet III, with dust jet II in between. The individual jets come from sources with an area of less than 300 by 300 meters (1,000 feet square)-- about the size of a football stadium --probably stretched out rectangularly along the tiger stripes. The new data indicate that the water molecules are blasting off from Enceladus at faster than 600 meters per second (about 1,200 miles per hour).


For more information about the Cassini-Huygens mission, visit

Credit: NASA/JPL/University of Colorado/SSI


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