Cassini Gets Good Look at ‘Rubble Pile’ Moon
From Times Staff and Wire Reports
The Swiss-cheese-like surface of Saturn’s small moon Epimetheus is revealed in an image captured by the Cassini spacecraft from a distance of 46,000 miles. The many large, softened craters on the moon -- which is 72 miles in diameter -- indicate a surface that is several billion years old.
Spectra indicate that the moon is mostly water ice, but its density is much lower than that of solid ice, indicating it is a “rubble pile” held together by gravity.
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