History of Hubble Space Telescope (HST)

This color image of Saturn was taken with the Hubble Space Telescope's (HST's) Wide Field Camera (WFC) at 3:25 am EDT, August 26, 1990, when the planet was at a distance of 2.39 million km (360 million miles) from Earth. The color in the image is reconstructed by combining three different pictures, taken in blue, green and red light (4390, 5470 and 7180 angstroms). Because Saturn's north pole is currently tilted toward Earth (24 degrees), the HST image reveals unprecedented detail in atmospheric features at the northern polar hood, a region not extensively imaged by the Voyager space probes. The classic features of Saturn's vast ring system are also clearly seen from outer to irner edge; the bright A and B rings, divided by the Cassini division, and the very faint inner C ring. The Enche division, a dark gap near the outer edge of the A ring, has never before been photographed from Earth.