A spectacular shot of serene Saturn for #SpaceSaturday. From a distance, Saturn seems to exude an aura of serenity and peace. In spite of this appearance, Saturn is an active and dynamic world. Its atmosphere is a fast-moving and turbulent place with wind speeds in excess of 1,100 miles per hour (1,800 km per hour) in places. The lack of a solid surface to create drag means that there are fewer features to slow down the wind than on a planet like Earth.
The image was taken with the Cassini spacecraft wide-angle camera in Feb., 2015 using a spectral filter centered at 752 nanometers, in the near-infrared portion of the spectrum. The view was obtained at a distance of approximately 1.6 million miles (2.5 million kilometers) from Saturn; image scale is 96 miles (150 kilometers) per pixel.
Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/Space Science Institute
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