Bizarre boulders litter Saturn moon's icy surface (Enceladus)

New Scientist ^ | 7/19/05 | Stuart Clark

[Maceman]

CAPTION: Giant boulders appear as white bumps in this close-up shot of Enceladus. They do not fill in the cracks on the icy moon's surface, suggesting the boulders formed before the fractures (Image: NASA/JPL/Space Science Institute)

[jra]

Cold enchiladas? I'll pass.

[SlowBoat407]

They way I see it, when a crack opens up, it swallows whatever is on the downhill slope and then fills in with a liquid that freezes on the surface and essentially creates a fresh cover.

... but I did stay at a Holiday Inn Suites.

[Gefreiter]

I'm holding off until I hear what George Noory has to say about this.

[bruin66]

"...Enceladus is six times smaller than Europa"

Not possible. Perhaps 1/6 the size of Europa?

[LibWhacker]

LOL

Was watching Natalie's mom on tv yesterday talking about Joran van der Sloot and she kept calling him 'Urine.' Urine did this. Urine did that. Urine on the beach, lol.

[AntiGuv]

Highest albedo in the solar system:

[from occupied ga]

John Spencer, a Cassini team member at the Southwest Research Institute in Boulder, Colorado, US, agrees that the images are puzzling. “You would expect to see small craters or a smooth, snow-covered landscape at this resolution," he told New Scientist. "This is just strange. In fact, I have a really hard time understanding what I’m seeing.”

However, spending a lot more taxpayer dollars will help us all get the answer which has surely puzzled billions of people worldwide, namely, where do the icy boulders on Encelaus come from. I know it's kept me up many nights.

[from occupied ga]

What, the highest libdo you say?

[-YYZ-]

Where do people learn to write these days? This: "when Cassini will skim even closer than ever" is a poorly constructed phrase. It would suffice to say that "Cassini will skim even closer", or "Cassini will skim closer than ever," but to use both "even" and "ever" is redundant.

[akorahil]

Highest albedo in the solar system:

Huh. And here I thought the moon took the honors. Goes to show you learn something new every day on FR.

[AntiGuv]

Very obviously. Enceladus is covered in water ice and has an atmosphere of ionized water vapor. If it has an ocean beneath the ice, it may well be the best location to find life in the solar system away from earth. Europa gets much more intense radiation from Jupiter than does Enceladus.

[LibWhacker]

I don't like it either but it's a common colloquialism, isn't it? You see it all the time: 'n times smaller than x' means x/n.

Makes sense in a way: 'n times larger' means you multiply the quantity in question by n -- 'n times smaller' means you multiply the quantity in question by one over n. 'Ya don't see it much in the math journals though!

[Red Badger]

Cold enchiladas with boulders, yet!.....

[threeleftsmakearight]

Covered in "water ice"?
What flavor?

[AntiGuv]

Enceladus has an albedo of .99 - it don't get any higher than that!!