The Crown of Tethys. Credit: NASA/JPL/Space Science Institute
Jan 30, 2017
Tethys is an electrically scarred moon.
The plasmasphere of Saturn generates lightning a million times more powerful than anything on Earth. Saturn also emits twice the energy than it receives from the Sun, including 90 megawatts of X-rays. In part, Saturn’s energetic fields exist because Saturn is quite large compared to Earth; its equatorial diameter is 120,500 kilometers. The Cassini orbiter observed narrow “jets” of hot plasma moving inward from Saturn’s outer ring structures, tentatively identified by mission specialists as part of a plasma exchange sequence from its moons. This means that Saturn’s moons do not exist in an electrically neutral environment—they travel through complex fields and forces. Tethys is a case in point.
Cassini’s prime objective is understanding the nature and evolution of Saturn’s family of satellites. The dominant feature on Tethys is the 8-kilometer-deep by 440-kilometer-wide Odysseus impact basin. Along with Odysseus is a topographic ridge between 3 kilometers high. Between the ridge and Odysseus is a ancient multi-ringed basin defined by steep walls and broad internal terraces. The inner ring is formed by a 140-kilometer circular band of mountains. The internal structure and multiple rings are thought to be from “rebound” when a large asteroid struck Tethys.
Tethys is 1071 kilometers across, so a 440 kilometer crater represents a significant fraction of its surface area. Another feature that is believed to be left over from that impact is the 400-meter-deep Ithaca Chasma, thought to be a globe-girdling “shock wave” of previously molten regolith frozen-in to the surface.
Tethys joins Dione and Enceladus in spewing charged particles into the ring structure around Saturn. Like Enceladus, the “plumes” are ejected from numerous hot spots. Evidence exists that Tethys also contributes to the plasma trapped within Saturn’s magnetosphere. Data from Cassini’s Plasma Spectrometer (CAPS) determined that plasma electrons were emitted from Tethys and Dione. In an Electric Universe, charged particles from Tethys are due to plasma discharges erupting in the same way that Jupiter’s moon Io contributes sulfur plasma to Jupiter’s magnetosphere.
It seems likely that conditions in the past were far more energetic. The grooves and canyons of Ithaca Chasma run parallel to each other. They have sharp rims and begin abruptly with no gradually eroded look to them. They have side canyons running off at ninety-degree angles, they are shallow, with no debris around them.
Regarding EDM effects on planetary bodies, Electric Universe theorist and author Wal Thornhill wrote: “In the case of the interplanetary thunderbolt, we are talking about billions of amperes (giga-amperes). Such a powerful current will magnetically ‘pinch’ down to produce circular ringed craters…Current flows radially between the current cylinders through the surface layers causing melting and etching of the crater floor or basin….similar to the radial and concentric discharge patterns seen in the dense plasma focus device where the discharge current is forced to flow radially between two concentric conductors.”
When intense particle beams touch down on a solid surface, electricity flowing through plasma creates a central column surrounded by concentric cylinders. The cylindrical current filaments exhibit long-range attraction and short-range repulsion, resulting in evenly spaced vortices surrounding the column.
The steep-walled scarps on Tethys are reminiscent of those on Enceladus, Dione, Jupiter’s moon Europa, or Hadley Rille on the Moon. It could also be said that the great Rift Valley on Earth shares some characteristics with the long chasms that span other worlds.
Size is not important; mineralogical composition is not important; temperature or distance from the Sun are not important—what is important are the electric currents flowing through space and their interactions with clouds of plasma. Lightning bolts of immense size and power can be generated that can tear any matter to pieces.
Stephen Smith
