APOD: Northern Summer on Titan (2017 Jun 22)

[APOD Robot]

Northern Summer on Titan

Explanation: While yesterday's solstice brought summer to planet Earth's northern hemisphere, a northern summer solstice arrived for ringed planet Saturn nearly a month ago on May 24. Following the Saturnian seasons, its large moon Titan was captured in this Cassini spacecraft image from June 9. The near-infrared view finds bright methane clouds drifting through Titan's northern summer skies as seen from a distance of about 507,000 kilometers. Below Titan's clouds, dark hydrocarbon lakes sprawl near the large moon's now illuminated north pole.

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[distefanom]

I wonder what would be to stand aside those shores or to sail in a methane ocean....
Are there seawaves-like under the (methane?) wind, see franking of the methane seawaves?
Would methane evaporate partially when slams on the rocks?
would you be surprised if founding some kind of living being floating in there?

[neufer]

I wonder what would be to stand aside those shores or to sail in a methane ocean....

I remember going to summer camp (Camp Pocomoonshine) on the shores of Lake Champlain back in 1957. They had wonderfully dark skies from which I got to observe the beautiful Comet Mrkos. Lake Champlain is quite similar to the lakes on Titan except that the swimming in Lake Champlain was much colder .

[Devil Particle]

When does summer begin on the Earth's moon?

[neufer]

When does summer begin on the Earth's moon?

The angle between the ecliptic and the lunar equator is always just 1.543° so the Moon doesn't really have much in the way of seasons.

[Guest]

Is that bright ring an Aurora?

[Chris Peterson]

Is that bright ring an Aurora?

An aurora wouldn't be visible in a daylight, near-IR image. Just methane clouds. Also, as Titan doesn't have much of a magnetic field, it shouldn't be possible to have auroras in the usual sense. Instead, you might have diffuse, whole hemisphere glows, but they'd be difficult to detect.

[Guest]

Ok, so any guess at what the bright arc is?

[Chris Peterson]

Ok, so any guess at what the bright arc is?

As noted, methane clouds.

[MarkBour]

I wonder what would be to stand aside those shores or to sail in a methane ocean....

This article also wonders, and provides a few relevant, fun facts: https://futurism.com/a-day-swimming-in- ... -of-titan/

I remember going to summer camp (Camp Pocomoonshine) on the shores of Lake Champlain back in 1957. They had wonderfully dark skies from which I got to observe the beautiful Comet Mrkos. Lake Champlain is quite similar to the lakes on Titan except that the swimming in Lake Champlain was much colder .

Must have been a bad year, if the water was colder than -178C .

[Boomer12k]

Well.... on the surface, it sounds romantic... BUT....I will take OUR Summer, and hot dogs, and picnics... etc....

:---[===] *

[distefanom]

Many Thanks MarkBour : I loved alot to read those funny facts about titan....
BTW, I wonder if wouldn't be interesting to "recreate" other planet's environement in kinda "sandbox" here on earth, where from the outside scientists could directly "see" how the enviorenemt reacts to certain stimuli, like i.e. try to directly "see" if liquid methane at those freezing temperature could really "carve" terrain as we imagine and how or "see" the Methane rain in reality.
In general, I think scientists should "pay" some time in relevant simulations in REAL chambers (sandboxes) where to check if certain experiments have a true significance or not.
Lurking on the net, I've found some (little) temptatives, but almost all of them have the size of a bin or a shoebox.
I think a LIFESIZE sandbox, would give interesting info's right before actual getting there.