The Moon feels like Earth’s kid brother, but Saturn’s moons are more like gnats on an elephant, as illustrated in this incredible image captured by the Cassini probe.
Pictured here are Saturn’s moons Mimas (right) and Dione (left) staring up at their behemoth of a planet, with the unilluminated side of the rings angled about one degree from the ring plane. Although certainly large enough to be noticeable, at 386km and 1123km across respectively, Mimas and Dione are quite a bit smaller than Earth’s moon (3476km across). And they’re total pipsqueaks on the scale of the Saturn system, with the gas giant itself measuring 121,344km across, and its ring system extending more than a thousand fold further out into space.
We all grew up learning that the gas giants are massive, but images like this really help put the numbers in perspective.
[NASA]