“We should look for life on Saturn’s moon Enceladus,” says space activist Ariel Waldman https://t.co/NnOmMJprfi
— Capt. Mike Foreman (@foreman_mike) October 30, 2016
Enceladus is Saturn’s 6th largest moon and it’s covered by ice. It turns out that there is a watery ocean under that ice. According to an article in Nature titled “Icy Enceladus hides a watery ocean“:
Planetary scientists have found an ocean buried beneath the south pole of the Saturnian moon Enceladus by studying tiny anomalies in the flybys of the Cassini spacecraft. The discovery, which helps to explain earlier observations of geysers, makes Enceladus only the fourth Solar System body found to have a water ocean — making it a potential cradle for life.
In 2005, NASA’s Cassini spotted a plume of water vapour and ice spraying from the south pole of the 500-kilometre-wide body. The new findings show the likely source of this water: a 10-kilometre-thick layer of liquid — similar to the depth of the Mariana Trench, the deepest point in Earth’s oceans — covering much of Enceladus’s southern hemisphere and capped by 30 to 40 kilometres of ice.
If you are a space geek, add the Ars interview to your “Watch Later” list and enjoy at your convenience:
Featured image: Water World, courtesy NASA/JPL-Caltech
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