Saturn’s Rings and Moonlet

Description

Close-up of the outer part of the A Ring of the gas giant planet Saturn. At right is the Keeler Gap. At left is the start of the Encke Gap. This portion of the rings is around 3190 kilometres across. The small propeller-shaped white dashes at lower left show the location of a small moonlet. The propeller ‘blades’ are disturbances (several kilometres long) created by the passage of the moonlet (about 100 metres across). This propeller moonlet has been nicknamed ‘Bleriot’. Image obtained on 11 November 2012, by the narrow-angle camera on the orbiting Cassini spacecraft. (Photo by Science Photo Library)