The Herschel Expedition On August the 28th 1789 Sir William Herschel discovered the moon Enceladus wich orbits the planet Saturn. Not much was known until the two Voyagers passed through the Saturn system in the early eighties and took some snapshots from this tiny moon. Enceladus reflects almost 100% of the sunlight that falls on it making it the brightest objects apart from the Sun itself. The Voyager photographs also showed that although the moon was tiny it had a wide range of terrains ranging from old, heavily cratered surfaces to young, tectonically deformed terrain. The Voyagers also found that Enceladus orbits in the densest part of the vary faint E-ring, this might hint at a possible interaction between the two. The great discoveries came with Cassini, it found active geyers on this small moon, the fourth body in our solar system with active volcanism (Earth being the first, then the Jupiter moon Io, The Neptune moon Triton and now Enceladus, there is a hint that Venus hides some massive volcanic activity, but there is no conclusive evidence yet to support this). And those Geyers spew liquid water, for the very first time we detected liquid water outside our own planet. That made Enceladus a possible candidate for alien life, and if there is life than it will be most likely easier to find as on the Jupiter moon Europa, Europa lies within the radiation belts of Jupiter, it might have a ocean underneath the ice, but that would require extensive drilling to reach that water. On Enceladus wich surface recieves only a fraction of the radiation that is toasting Europa you can land next to a geyser and simply stick your tonque out and taste it. And that's what this expedition is all about, the first craft left Earth orbit a few months ago and will bring a lander-hab and equipment to Enceladus. The two craft pictured here carry a crew of four in one vehicle, the other carries more supplies and the Enceladus-Lander. From this point its still a four year journey.