by Dr. Tony Phillips
The European Space Agency's (ESA's) Huygens probe, carried to Saturn by the Cassini spacecraft, parachuted to the surface of Saturn's giant moon Titan on Friday, Jan. 14th, revealing finally what lies beneath Titan's thick orange clouds.
First images released by the ESA depict sinuous drainage channels leading to an apparent shoreline. What's draining? Possibly liquid methane. The orange landscape around the Huygens landing site is littered with little rocks, rounded and smooth like river-rocks on Earth. One of the images seems to show tendrils of ground fog made not of water but perhaps ethane or methane.