What it is: Saturn’s biggest moon, Titan

Where it is: Around 750 million miles(1.2 billion kilometers) from Earth

When it was shared: May 4, 2006

Why it’s so unique: This image was taken by the European Space Agency’s Huygens probe throughout its historical parachute descent onto Titan’s surface area on Jan. 14, 2005. At the minute this image was caught, the probe was roughly 3 miles (5 km) above Saturn’s biggest moon. The probe’s descent from its moms and dad spacecraft, NASA’s Cassini, took roughly 2.5 hours. When Huygens landed with a thud near the intense equatorial area of Adiri, it made history as the very first and just probe to land in the external planetary system. The probe brought instruments to study Titan’s smog-like environment, chemical homes, wind, temperature level and pressure. It was likewise geared up with electronic cameras to record Titan’s surface area.

The probe itself was not developed to stand up to the landing, it not just made it through however likewise returned images of freezing Titan’s surface area for another hour and 10 minutes after goal, till its batteries passed away.

Throughout the years, images gathered by Huygens’ Descent Imager/Spectral Radiometer instrument exposed that Titan’s surface area has Earth-like functions consisting of narrow drain canals, dry lake beds, islands and shoals. 2 more instruments– the Gas Chromatograph and Mass Spectrometer and the Surface Science Package– supplied engaging proof for the existence of methane rain and liquid streaming on TitanThe rivers and lakes appeared dry when Huygens touched down, proof recommended that liquid methane might have streamed throughout the moon’s surface area not long earlier.

The Huygens landing belonged to the Cassini objective, which released on Oct. 15, 1997. In 2017, after 20 years of thrilling expedition, the spacecraft made its last method to Saturn, plunged into its environment, and burned up, drastically ending its exceptional journey.