Enceladus, Saturn's Moon, Shows Youth
IMAGE CREDIT: NASA
by Owen Borville
March 21, 2019
Astronomy
Another moon of Saturn, Enceladus, appears to be young according to creationists. Enceladus was discovered by William Herschel in 1789. The NASA Voyager 1 space probe was launched in 1977 and provided the first close encounter with Enceladus by the early 1980's while the Voyager 2 space probe revealed more detailed information about the surface of this moon. NASA's Cassini-Huygens space probe was launched in 1997 and provided two decades of new information about Saturn and its moons until the probe was lost from contact in 2017. While evolutionists had thought that this moon was "cold and dead", scientists have recently noticed activity on Enceladus via space probes. This activity included geysers ejecting plumes of water vapor and ice particles at "supersonic" speeds, indicating that Enceladus is still geologically active. Cassini discovered that geyser-like jets spew water vapor and ice particles from an underground ocean beneath the icy crust of Enceladus. With its global ocean, unique chemistry, and internal heat, Enceladus has some characteristics that resemble Earth and that could support life. In addition, Enceladus shows signs of having internal heat, while evolutionary models show that this moon should have frozen solid long ago. The ejections are are all located at the South Pole, an extremely unusual location for this activity. Scientists have observed that Enceladus is ejecting too rapidly to justify an evolutionary age in the billions of years. At the current eruption rate, Enceladus would have ejected one sixth of its mass and recycled its entire mass, as observed by the Cassini space probe. With these rates, evolutionists have trouble fitting Enceladus into their uniformitarian models. The geologic and volcanic activity of a relatively small moon such as Enceladus gives evidence for its youth within the creation model with a 6,000 year time frame.
Coppedge, D. 2006. Enceladus: A Cold, Youthful Moon. Acts & Facts. 35 (11).
NASA Jet Propulsion Laboratory Voyager Fact Sheet. The Voyager Planetary Mission. https://voyager.jpl.nasa.gov/frequently-asked-questions/fact-sheet/.
NASA Science Solar System Exploration https://solarsystem.nasa.gov/missions/cassini/science/enceladus/.
IMAGE CREDIT: NASA
by Owen Borville
March 21, 2019
Astronomy
Another moon of Saturn, Enceladus, appears to be young according to creationists. Enceladus was discovered by William Herschel in 1789. The NASA Voyager 1 space probe was launched in 1977 and provided the first close encounter with Enceladus by the early 1980's while the Voyager 2 space probe revealed more detailed information about the surface of this moon. NASA's Cassini-Huygens space probe was launched in 1997 and provided two decades of new information about Saturn and its moons until the probe was lost from contact in 2017. While evolutionists had thought that this moon was "cold and dead", scientists have recently noticed activity on Enceladus via space probes. This activity included geysers ejecting plumes of water vapor and ice particles at "supersonic" speeds, indicating that Enceladus is still geologically active. Cassini discovered that geyser-like jets spew water vapor and ice particles from an underground ocean beneath the icy crust of Enceladus. With its global ocean, unique chemistry, and internal heat, Enceladus has some characteristics that resemble Earth and that could support life. In addition, Enceladus shows signs of having internal heat, while evolutionary models show that this moon should have frozen solid long ago. The ejections are are all located at the South Pole, an extremely unusual location for this activity. Scientists have observed that Enceladus is ejecting too rapidly to justify an evolutionary age in the billions of years. At the current eruption rate, Enceladus would have ejected one sixth of its mass and recycled its entire mass, as observed by the Cassini space probe. With these rates, evolutionists have trouble fitting Enceladus into their uniformitarian models. The geologic and volcanic activity of a relatively small moon such as Enceladus gives evidence for its youth within the creation model with a 6,000 year time frame.
Coppedge, D. 2006. Enceladus: A Cold, Youthful Moon. Acts & Facts. 35 (11).
NASA Jet Propulsion Laboratory Voyager Fact Sheet. The Voyager Planetary Mission. https://voyager.jpl.nasa.gov/frequently-asked-questions/fact-sheet/.
NASA Science Solar System Exploration https://solarsystem.nasa.gov/missions/cassini/science/enceladus/.
