Arrival at Titan: Huygens Probe to Take the Plunge

[Aessotariq]

This is too cool!

Arrival at Titan: Huygens Probe to Take the Plunge

By Tariq Malik

Staff Writer

posted: 14 January 2005

12:30 a.m. ET

A European probe is plummeting toward Saturn's moon Titan and expected to land on the mysterious moon, which has perplexed astronomers for years, in just a few hours.

Built by the European Space Agency (ESA), the 705-pound (320-kilogram) Huygens probe is expected to reach Titan at about 4:05 a.m. EST (0905 GMT) and beam data home via the NASA's Cassini orbiter.

SPACE.com's preview of today's Huygens landing is available here. Refresh this page to get live updates of Huygen's status as they become available.

http://www.space.com/missionlaunches/huyge...omm_050114.html

[PghUSA]

Very cool news . . . wondering why this isn't being covered as much in the states yet.

[Aessotariq]

I don't know why either... I get most of my world news from the BBC and Reuters anyways, since we seem to be devoid of international news here... That's how I found out about the probe.

[Aessotariq]

Huygens Probe Returns First Images of Titan's Surface

By Peter de Selding

Space News Staff Writer

posted: 14 January 2005

3:30 p.m. ET

This story was updated at 6:27 p.m. EST.

DARMSTADT, Germany -- The first pictures revealing the surface of Saturn's moon, Titan, were shown from Europe's Huygens probe, showing what look like drainage channels on the surface of what until today has been a planet totally hidden from view.

The image unveiling marked the end of a successful journey for the hardy Huygens probe and the culmination of 25 years of work by mission managers, scientists, engineers and supporters.