[Geysers] Enceladus: A new geyser basin, but it's going to be a REALLY long hike...

[Davis, Brian L.]

>From the outside-the-park news desk, the geysers on Enceladus have gotten even more interesting. Thermally they've determined that theses are not shallow systems but deep one, and they've also mapped them (including vent angle).

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-2709100/Alright-geyser-Nasa-spots-101-euptions-surface-Saturns-icy-moon-Enceladus.html

Here's the NASA JPL press release:

http://www.jpl.nasa.gov/news/news.php?release=2014-246

And finally a little more detail from the Cassini imaging folks:

http://www.ciclops.org/view_event/202?js=1

Another interesting tidbit is that these geysers very clearly cycle based on tidal effects… which given their location (one of the more tidally flexed areas of a moon orbiting the 2nd largest planet in the solar system) isn't surprising, but it's neat that they can piece that out from the data.

I wonder what Susan Kieffer is thinking right now - these are exactly the sort of thing she's been working on. I might ask her the next time I talk to her (trying to find out about the possible release of the down-borehole camera video from OF). 

-- 
Brian Davis