Enceladus is blanketed in a thick layer of snow

The fluff suggests the moon’s famous plume was once more active than it is today

This chain of craters on Enceladus looks like a Saturnian snowman, but it’s actually made from snow draining into fissures underneath.

JPL-Caltech/NASA, Space Science Institute

January 13, 2023 at 9:00 am

Saturn’s moon Enceladus is shrouded in a thick layer of snow. In some places, the downy stuff is 700 meters deep, new research suggests.

“It’s like Buffalo, but worse,” says planetary scientist Emily Martin, referring to the famously snowy city in New York.