The Many Moons Of Saturn | Breakthrough

[@mikezizis3725]

4 1/2 billion years go ...

[@SandstormGT]

You confused about something?

[@Booger-u6m]

It sounded like the announcer said our moon formed millions of years ago, not billions.

[@inc2000glw]

Better than the news.

[@shivshiv9867]

Saturn infinity planet

[@badone3009]

LMFAO. What is NASA's Hubble doing in orbit? Why are we still using primitive land-based telescopes?

[@Booger-u6m]

Hubble is occasionally used for observing the planets, but it can only point one direction at a time and there are hundreds of astronomers that want to use it for observing other things, so time on the Hubble is at a premium and difficult to obtain. Using ground based telescopes provides more opportunities for observations and time on these is a little easier to get. There have been a lot of advances in observing technology over the past 30 years or so. Some ground based scopes can now produce images at least as good as Hubble, enabling astronomers to gather much more data than they could just a couple of decades ago. For these reasons, astronomers often use ground based telescopes to observe planets, rather than Hubble.

[@Benson_aka_devils_advocate_88]

​​@@Booger-u6m the different systems also compliment each other. Space based scopes can see wavelengths that normally get absorbed by our atmosphere like x-rays. Ground based scopes can see the much longer waves like radio. And as you stated, space scopes tend to have long wait times. But ground based run the risk of having cloudy skies stop your observations. It's a given and take situation, depending on what you need.