An astrophotographer has been capturing spectacular images of solar eclipses taking place on Saturn — capturing Titan’s shadow on the surface of the planet.
Saturn, one of the solar system’s gas giants, is being eclipsed, or transited, by its largest moon Titan several times over the coming months. After this busy period, there will not be another eclipse for 13 years.
Titan is an intriguing moon that is larger than the planet Mercury and could potentially harbor life. It has a dense atmosphere, mostly made of nitrogen, and has liquid methane and ethane on its surface — the only other place in the solar system that is known to have stable liquid on the surface.
“I got up at 3 A.M. to capture a solar eclipse on Saturn by its largest moon, Titan. These happen for a few months followed by a 15-year gap,” explains AJ Smadi in a Reddit post.
However, Titan wasn’t the only one of Saturn’s moons Smadi captured, also capturing Rhea, Dione, Tethys, and Enceladus in his images. Saturn has a whopping 145 moons confirmed, the most of any planet in the solar system.
“Many moons can be seen in the image as well,” Smadi writes on Instagram. “And the Cassini division is now quite noticeable thanks to the near-perfect conditions during the morning twilight hours.” The Cassini division is a prominent gap that separates Saturn’s A and B rings.
“Galileo would lose his mind over this shot. Well done!” writes one Redditor. Smadi is an amateur astrophotographer who took the image of Saturn on a backyard telescope. He has previously captured a solar eclipse on Jupiter as well.
Smadi called the photo a “bucket list shot of mine” adding that “every 15 years, there’s a brief few months when Saturn’s largest moon Titan casts its shadow over Saturn every orbit. This is one of those years.”
More of Smadi’s work can be found on his Instagram and Reddit.
Image credits: AJ Smadi.