The Last Photos Cassini Took Before NASA Destroyed It

On September 15, 2017, NASA flew the Cassini spacecraft into Saturn at about 70,000 mph, on purpose. The day before, it took one last photo. Here's the story of its final days, told with Cassini's real images: the ice moon that forced NASA's hand, landing on Titan, 22 dives between Saturn and its rings, and the 83 minutes when the signal kept coming from a spacecraft that was already gone. Which would you have chosen: crash it, or keep it flying? Tell me in the comments. 0:00 Cassini's last photo 0:42 Why NASA had to destroy it 1:50 The 7-year journey 2:45 Landing on Titan 3:49 What Cassini saw 5:14 The Grand Finale 6:21 What it learned 7:16 The last photos 8:11 The final plunge 9:28 What it left behind Sources: NASA Cassini mission pages and Quick Facts; NASA/JPL end-of-mission press release and timeline (Sept 15, 2017); NASA Photojournal image captions; ESA Cassini-Huygens pages; Iess et al., Science (2019). Credits: Images: NASA/JPL-Caltech/Space Science Institute. Huygens images: ESA/NASA/JPL/University of Arizona. Titan radar: NASA/JPL-Caltech/ASI. Grand Finale animation: NASA/JPL-Caltech. Mission control footage: NASA TV. Launch and build photos: NASA/KSC. Canberra dish: NASA/JPL-Caltech. Narration: Kokoro TTS. Music: Light Years Out.