Hyperion in Color: a Composite from Cassini’s Last Visit

Here’s a color view of Hyperion made from raw images acquired in optical wavelengths by Cassini during its flyby on May 31, 2015 – the last pass it will make by this moon during its mission. Read more about this flyby here.

Cassini To Make Its Last Pass Of Hyperion

This coming Sunday, May 31, the Cassini spacecraft will perform its last close pass of Hyperion, Saturn’s curiously spongelike moon. At approximately 9:36 a.m. EDT (13:36 UTC) it will zip past Hyperion at a distance of about 21,000 miles (34,000 km) – which may sound like a lot but but it’s even closer (by 17,500 miles/28,160 km) than it was when the image…

High Over Hyperion

The Cassini spacecraft passed by Saturn’s spongy-looking moon Hyperion yesterday, August 25, and returned some very dramatic images like the one seen here – fascinating! At 15,000 miles this was Cassini’s second-closest approach to Hyperion. It will pass by again on September 16 at just over twice that distance. The closest it has come to Hyperion…

Hyperion

Here’s a wonderful color mosaic of Saturn’s moon Hyperion, assembled by Gordan Ugarkovic from four Cassini narrow-angle camera images. The moon’s heavily cratered sponge-like surface can be seen in vivid detail due to the high phase angle of sunlight, making its rough texture even more pronounced. At 255 x 163 x 137 miles in diameter,…

Spongebob Spacepants

Covered with deep, punched-in craters, Saturn’s 168-mile- (270-km-) wide moon Hyperion resembles a sea sponge more than it does a moon. But a moon it is…in fact, Hyperion is the largest irregularly-shaped moon in the solar system. This image, one of the first sent back from Cassini since awakening from its three-week-long “safe mode” following…

An Example of Extremes

Giant, haze-covered Titan sits in front of  craggy, potato-shaped Hyperion in this image from Cassini, taken on November 13. These two vastly different moons occupy neighboring orbits and thus affect each other’s travels around Saturn…although Titan obviously takes the lead in this dance. 168-mile-wide Hyperion is forced to speed up and slow down as it…