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The Strangest Sights Cassini Saw: Postcards From Saturn | NPR's SKUNK BEAR

The Cassini spacecraft is a victim of its own success. It astonished scientists by finding conditions potentially suitable for life beneath the surface of one of Saturn's icy moons, Enceladus.

When Cassini runs out of fuel it could accidentally crash into this pristine world, spreading earthly contamination. So researchers decided that the spacecraft must be destroyed. That's why, on Friday, it will slam itself 

It's a dramatic end to an impressive career. For over a decade, Cassini has orbited around Saturn 294 times, collected more than 600 GB of data, visited over a dozen moons and discovered at least seven new ones. It has sent over 400,000 images back home.

Skunk Bear, NPR's science video channel, has stitched together thousands of those photos to showcase some beautiful (and often weird) scenes from our solar system.

Folllow more intriguing science videos by Skunk Bear on 

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Adam Cole

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Ryan Kellman

NASA's Cassini spacecraft will crash into Saturn on Friday, but we'll always have the shots it took of icy volcanoes, hexagonal storms, ethane lakes and ripples in Saturn's rings.

Saturn's strangest sights, as captured by a doomed spacecraft

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