Why Astronauts Have Never Landed on Saturn: Gas Giant, Temperature, and Electric Current

Jakarta –

Of the many outer space missions that have been carried out, planet Saturn never made a destination. What is the reason?

Saturn is a very large planet, the second largest in the solar system. The size of Saturn can contain as many as 760 Earths in it. The distance from Saturn to Earth is around 1.2 billion kilometers.

Despite being big, astronauts have never landed on this planet. What are the reasons underlying the absence of space missions to come and land on Saturn?

Gas Giant Planet

Launch IFL Sciencethe most compelling reason for the question is because Saturn is a type of planet known as a gas giant. Saturn, like the gas giant Jupiter, is composed almost entirely of hydrogen, helium, and icy remnants containing water, ammonia, and methane.

In even deeper layers, hydrogen becomes liquid under pressure. Beneath that, is the heavier helium. In the layer below again, hydrogen is converted to metallic hydrogen. As before, the core of Saturn is estimated to contain rocks that are 10 times the mass of Earth.

Scientists suspect that Saturn has a core made of iron and nickel. However, they weren’t sure if it was liquid, like the previous layers, or solid, like the Earth’s core. Even though the core of Saturn is liquid, if humans enter it, it is estimated that they can still stand first on these rocks.

High Saturn Temperature and Pressure

The next reason why astronauts never land on Saturn is due to internal pressure and temperature. The amount of pressure will prevent astronauts from reaching it.

Atmospheric pressure on Earth is just over 1 bar, while on Saturn it is over 1 million bar. If the astronauts survive the crash, they will burn in temperatures reaching tens of thousands of degrees Celsius.

Thus, no one ever thought of getting to Saturn because astronauts could be destroyed before landing on the planet’s surface. The temperature there is 83,000 degrees Celsius hotter than the surface of the sun, hot enough to dissolve spacecraft that come there.

Great Electric Current

Collect Business Insider, Saturn’s magnetic field generates enormous electric currents, heating the atmosphere at the poles. Unfortunately, electrical activity within the planet can interfere with the electronics and navigation systems of astronaut ships.

Inside the hydrogen layer Saturn, there is an electric current that produces a magnetic field on Saturn. Even though its magnetic field is weaker than Earth’s, it can have a magnetic moment 580 times greater than Earth’s.

The magnetic field strength from Saturn can be estimated to be about 1/20th that of Jupiter’s magnetic field strength.

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2023-09-05 01:30:42
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