PIA03883: Artists's Conception of Cassini Saturn Orbit Insertion
This is an artists concept of NASA's Cassini spacecraft during the Saturn Orbit Insertion (SOI) maneuver, just after the main engine has begun firing.
 Target Name:  Saturn
 Is a satellite of:  Sol (our sun)
 Mission:  Cassini-Huygens 
 Spacecraft:  Cassini Orbiter
 Product Size:  14400 x 9600 pixels (w x h) 
 Produced By:  JPL 
 Primary Data Set:  Cassini 
 Full-Res TIFF:  PIA03883.tif (116.6 MB)
 Full-Res JPEG:  PIA03883.jpg (4.393 MB)  

Click on the image above to download a moderately sized image in JPEG format (possibly reduced in size from original)

Original Caption Released with Image:

This is an artists concept of Cassini during the Saturn Orbit Insertion (SOI) maneuver, just after the main engine has begun firing. The spacecraft is moving out of the plane of the page and to the right (firing to reduce its spacecraft velocity with respect to Saturn) and has just crossed the ring plane.

The SOI maneuver, which is approximately 90 minutes long, will allow Cassini to be captured by Saturn's gravity into a five-month orbit.Cassini's close proximity to the planet after the maneuver offers a unique opportunity to observe Saturn and its rings at extremely high resolution.

Image Credit:
NASA/JPL

Image Addition Date:
2002-12-11