Bad news for observers of the sky. Whether they have twins, glasses or telescope, whether the sky is cloudy or very pure, the magnificent Saturn rings are now out of their reach. And, they will remain so for a very long time.
At the observatory of the Ajaccian amateur club of astronomy, located in Vignola, the celestial event is now proven. “For a few weeks, by observing Saturn it seems that the rings have completely disappeared”notes Lucien Luciani, the club president.
4,700 kilometers between rings A and B
The phenomenon is not irreversible, far from it. It is simply the result of an optical illusion, “Due to the inclination of the rings compared to the plan of the orbit of Saturn around the sun”he completes.
The hide-and-seek game is not new. It occurs, on average every 15 years, when “The rings plan is exactly in the optical axis of a terrestrial observer. The average thickness of the rings being only a few tens of meters, they, seen at a billion and a half km, are reduced to the thickness of a hair and seem to be striped from the sky map”explain lovers of Ajaccian astronomy.
And this is the scenario that predominates at the moment in the infinite of the universe. As Lucien Luciani reminds us, “On March 23, 2025, the earth was exactly in the plan of the rings. So they begin to reopen little by little with a maximum which will not be reached in 2032”.
Depending on the calculations and the astronomical models chosen, the rings should make their presence felt, in a very discreet way, within 18 months. Before asserting itself gradually.
In reality, Saturn is surrounded by a multitude of rings. The main ones are named A, B, C, D, E, F, G according to the chronological order of their discovery. They are relatively close to each other, except “an opening 4,700 kilometers wide, called Cassini division, which separates rings A and B”indicates NASA on its website.
The subject of the origin which divides scientists
All have in common to be formed of “Thousands of pieces of ice and rock, some as large as a house, others as small as a pebble. They can be attracted or deformed by the gravitational interactions between the planet and its moons”develop Ajaccian astronomers.
Thanks to the elements that make them up, they are able to think of sunlight well and to offer a bright white spectacle, despite the flow of cosmic dust.
Their origin, on the other hand, is a subject that continues to divide scientists. In this regard, two major theories compete. According to the first, the rings would have formed “From several small satellites who came to turn too close to the planet”reports the club president.
These would have been caught up in the planet’s gravitation force, then broken, he continues under the so-called effect of the so-called “tidal forces”or “Roche limit”that’s to say “The distance from which a satellite from orbit too close to a planet begins to dislocate”. The information collected by the Cassini probe on a mission around Saturn seem, for the time being, going in the same direction.
128 new satellites since March 2025
The second hypothesis refers to debris generated by the formation of Saturn itself at the time of the birth of our solar system. An era, by definition, very hectic, punctuated by all -out bombings of rocky body and others in the immensity of the universe and time.
The sustainability of the rings as well as their life expectancy raise questions.
Scientists argue that the beautiful Saturn rings will have an end, one day or another. Estimates concerning their lifespan vary from 100 to 300 million years. Everything may well depend on the intensity of “Renies of rings”that is to say, in particular ice debris, attracted by the gravitational force of the planet.
In addition to its rings, Saturn has a whole kyrielle of satellites. “274 Orbit around the jewel of the sky. The statement recently accelerated, on March 11, 2025 after the announcement, suddenly, of 128 new satellites”note the members of the Ajaccian club.
The most famous of the group, Titan, has a diameter of 5,150 km.
Astronomers describe “One of the biggest satellites in our system. The first place returning to Ganymede, the largest satellite in Jupiter, with a diameter of 5,260 km. Our moon, with its 3,475 km in diameter occupies 5th place”.
A gaseous planet like Uranus and Neptune
Lucien Luciani, without a doubt, gave his preference to the planet, “With unique charm and unprecedented fascination power”. He has been convinced, since the creation of the Club and the Ajaccio Observatory, to be dealing “au jewel of heaven “, in nature According to him, to trigger many passions and vocations.
Like the other members of the club, he is full of praise for the celestial object, thus evoking, “Aesthetically and after our land, of course, the most beautiful and attractive star of our solar system. After the earth, because life reigns on the blue planet “. In contrast, Saturn radiates the cosmos of the beauty of the devil, revealing himself “as inhospitable as they are fascinating to observe “.
-Saturn still has the particularity of being the second largest planet in the solar system after Jupiter.
With the latter, she shares another characteristic, that of being a gaseous planet, like Uranus and Neptune too. Striking, the planet with the majestic rings does not have a rocky soil, “This prohibits any machine landing as well as any possibility for a human to walk on their surface”.
Its atmosphere consists of 93 % hydrogen (H2) and 5 % helium. The remaining 2 % being made up of water vapor and ammonia. “This is the reason why the density of the atmosphere of Saturn is less than 1. Thus, if we imagined being able to pose Saturn on a giant ocean, it would float. Amazing, right?”exclaims the president of the club.
Galileo spikes her telescope to the sky in 1610
Being the most distant planet visible to the naked eye is another of its distinctive features. This position on the borders and more concretely at 1.5 billion kilometers from the earth will make Saturn the limit of the solar system, at least until the end of the 18th century.
But, it is by Galileo, at the same time astronomer, mathematician, physicist, that it all really started.
The Italian is the first to rob his telescope towards Saturn, in the early morning, a fine day in July 1610, in Florence. Whoever begins to know the sky like his pocket – he spotted the craters on the moon, the satellites of Jupiter – then observes a barely believable spectacle, also indefinable.
“Unfortunately for him, the mediocre quality of his telescope, which was conceived very well for the time, did not allow him to distinguish the rings correctly. He took these growths for ears and described what he saw as a triple planet. Galileo still took care to save his discovery by publishing a sentence in Latin, ”The highest planet triple “”that we can translate par” The highest planet I observed is triple ”, “says the Ajaccian astronomer.
Two years later, his new observations reveal the disappearance of so-called growths. As in 2025, it’s all about inclination and point of view.
It will be necessary to wait almost half a century and Christian Huygens, a Dutch astronomer to affirm the existence of rings and understand their movements. By the way, he discovers a big moon in orbit around Sature. She will be called Titan. Huygens is much better equipped than his illustrious predecessor.
Saturn in a few figures
1.5 billion km. It is the distance that separates it from the sun.
120,000 km. It is its equatorial diameter, measured without its rings. A figure which corresponds to approximately 10 times the diameter of the earth (12,756 km).
Rings included, the circumference of the planet is 360,000 km, the equivalent, at the nearest 24,000 km, of the Terre-Lune distance or 384,000 km.
29.5 years. This is the time he takes to accomplish his revolution, that is to say, revolving around the sun.
10:30 a.m. it’s time she takes to take a look at herself.
Between -140 and -190 °, it is the average temperature felt on the planet with the rings.
The beautiful passages of the International Space Station (ISS) not to be missed
May 8. South West – North East at 10:39 p.m. by 83 °. Will disappear in the zenith under the big bear when it is vertically of Bonifacio.
May 9. South West – North East at 10:02 p.m. by 63 °. Will go vertically from Cagliari.
May 10. South West – North East at 9:25 p.m. by 47 °. Will go vertically from Tunis. That day the ISS will be visible 5 times in the Corsican sky, at 12:20 a.m., 02 h 58, 04 h 34 then at 9:25 p.m. and at 11:03 p.m.
24 never. South Oest – Northeast of 22 h 18 by 72 °. Passer to the south authetic
