Astounding Cassini picture of Hyperion (warning dial up)

[tocqueville]

Astronomers described Hyperion as spongy-looking with dark-floored craters that speckle its surface. Scientists don’t know what the dark material is.

In addition, the new images suggest the possibility that Hyperion’s crater walls have experienced multiple episodes of landslides. Such "downslope" movement is evident in the filling of craters with debris and the near elimination of many craters along the steeper slopes.

http://www.space.com/scienceastronomy/050930_saturn_moons.html

[bemildred]

1. Damn. Reality is weirder than anything you could just think up. nt

[NNadir]

2. That's awesome. Thanx for directing our attention to it.

[onager]

3. Yes, thank you for the pic! And by the way...

...I'm the DU Representative for your local Evil International Aerospace-Defense Company.

We built several of Cassini's critical systems.

You're welcome.

:hi:

[mainegreen]

4. *wow*

[Tesha]

5. "My God -- It's full of (wait for it) *TRIPE*" (NT)

[sakabatou]

6. Looks like it got ompacted hard on that side.

[NNadir]

7. More than a coincidence?

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=228x12504

[muriel_volestrangler]

8. It reminds me a little of some glaciers

where dark stones get on to the surface, and, absorbing more sunlight than the reflective ice, melt little vertical holes into the glacier. Whether that mechanism could work in space I don't know.

[electron_blue]

9. Wow, looks like something that went through a lot of outgassing/sublimatio

I wonder how icy Hyperion was in its past.