Saturn Probe Dives Past Rings for 1st Time

NASA's Cassini spacecraft grazed Saturn's iconic rings Sunday (Dec. 4), performing the first plunge of the long-lived mission's next-to-last phase. Cassini zoomed within 57,000 miles (91,000 kilometers) of Saturn's cloud tops on Sunday morning, diving through the planet's ring plane at about the spot where a faint ring generated by the small moons Janus and Epimetheus lies, NASA officials said. Cassini will perform 19 more such close passes, each one about a week apart, through April 22, 2017.