Ever since Galileo Galilei pointed the telescope at Saturn in 1610, it became a fascinating planet to explore. The scientists took their time investigating what is the planet made from and how far away it is. So, how long would it take to get to Saturn?
The average duration of the trip to Saturn is around 5 years, based on previous experience. A lot of factors affect the duration of the trip. It would take humans 8 years to reach Saturn. The distance between the Earth and Saturn varies because of orbiting.
In 1979, the first spacecraft Pioneer 11 flew past Saturn, and in the next two years, Voyager 1 and Voyager 2 probes flew past the ringed planet. They each took different travel paths to get to Saturn.
Can humans travel to Saturn at the moment?
Right now, the only ones to travel to Saturn were spacecraft. Spacecraft are robots that act like people in space. Humans and spacecraft cannot survive in space without protection, but humans require special care and protection. Spacecraft have specific shields to protect them from extreme heat and cold, as well as winds, vacuum, and radiation. Humans require oxygen, food, and water.
Right now the Space Shuttle is not equipped to travel outside of Earth’s orbit. It is currently 1 billion miles away from Saturn. Also, right now we do not have enough equipment to send humans to our Moon. Even though some spacecraft had the capacity of carrying humans, it doesn’t have the space to hold the food and water required for humans to survive.
Saturn itself is too cruel a planet for life to arise on it. In addition to gas clouds, Saturn constantly has very strong winds that can reach speeds of up to 1800 kilometers per hour. Saturn creates a tornado on its surface that no being would have time to blink before turning into cosmic dust.
Saturn, like all gas planets, is low in density so it has no solid surface. If you were to put Saturn on water, it would float. Humans can travel to Saturn because they wouldn’t have the ability to land. Instead, they would descend through electrical currents, winds, and massive pressure.
The troposphere is filled with ammonia crystals, which can cause major problems in the human respiratory system. The troposphere is also very freezing. The temperatures reach -250°C. It is yet unknown if the core of Saturn is liquid or solid. But it is known that the temperature of the core is 83,000 degrees Celsius, hotter than the surface of the Sun.
Scientists are interested in Titan, Saturn’s moon. The surface temperature is -180 degrees Celsius, there is no oxygen or water, but scientists still hope that they could find traces of life or at least complex organic molecules on it.
In addition to high winds, Saturn has a magnetosphere that is 580 times more powerful than Earth’s, meaning that it has high radiation in which humans cannot survive. We must discover how to build a spacecraft that will transport humans to Saturn, carry food, water, and oxygen.
How far is Saturn from Earth?
Saturn is the sixth planet in the solar system. It is 1,429,400,000 km away from the Sun. Saturn is the second-largest planet by volume and mass after Jupiter. Along with Jupiter, Uranus, and Neptune, it belongs to the group of gas giants.
The planet is 1.4 billion kilometers away from the Sun, or 9.5 times more than the Earth, and receives only 1% of the Sun’s energy that our planet receives.
We must first take into account the fact that all the planets of the solar system do not move in a circle but ellipses. There are times when the distance from the sun changes.
Therefore, the distance from Earth to Saturn will vary significantly. It is estimated that the minimum distance from Earth to Saturn in kilometers is 1195 million, while the maximum is 1.660 million. That distance is 8 times bigger than the distance between Earth and the Sun.
Research showed that the closest distance between Earth and Saturn happened on December 21, 1914, when the distance was 1,201 billion kilometers.
Spacecraft, like Cassini, cannot be launched directly to Saturn. They are too heavy and not powerful enough to slow down when needed. Instead, Cassini was towards Venus, flew by it two times, one time by Earth, and one by Jupiter. These flybys gave the Cassini enough power to increase speed using gravitational force from each planet.
Saturn travels 34,000 kilometers per hour, and it takes him almost 30 years to orbit once around the Sun.
How long would it take to get to Saturn?
This question has several answers. In the past, the trips taken to Saturn had different durations. Cassini spacecraft traveled for 6 years and 9 months.
Pioneer 11 was launched in April of 1973 and it took almost seven years to get to Saturn, reaching it in 1979.
The Voyager 1 spacecraft was launched in 1977, and it reached Saturn in 1980. Voyager 2 was launched a month before Voyager 1, but it arrived at Saturn in August of 1981.
The Cassini spacecraft took the longest to reach Saturn. It was launched in 1997 and using other planet’s gravitational forces, it reached Saturn seven years later, in 2004.
The first thing that affects travel time is if the spacecraft is launched directly to Saturn. Some spacecraft are launched toward other celestial objects before going to Saturn. The type of engine that fires the spacecraft is another factor. The last factor is the time it takes a spacecraft to slow down.
Cassini and Pioneer 11 used other planet’s gravitational influence which added two more years to their trip. Voyager 1 and 2 did not linger in the Solar System and they arrived at Saturn pretty quickly.
It is important to note that when you travel in space you don’t travel in a straight line. Most time traveling is taken by slowing down. If you don’t manage to slow down, you would fly past Saturn into deep space, because the gravitational force from Saturn won’t manage to pull you in.
Many scientists believe that the distance from Earth to Saturn can be overcome in 6 years and 9 months. It would take humans around 8 years to get to Saturn. The first spacecraft to fly past Saturn in 1979 was the Pioneer 11. It took 6.5 years to travel to Saturn.
The duration of the traveling also depends on the mass that is launched. Robotic spacecraft are very heavy and if you were to put humans (plus food and water to survive) it can triple the weight of the spacecraft. It means that you would need double the power to safely launch.
If there were humans on the spacecraft, you need to think about the trip back to Earth. All the launched spacecraft have used Jupiter’s gravitational force to assist them. When you reach Saturn, you might have to wait a long time for Jupiter to be in the right position to give power to the spacecraft.
How long would it take to get to Saturn at the speed of light?
As is well known, the speed of light, according to Einstein’s theory of relativity, is an insurmountable limit in the Universe. It seems unattainable to us. But on a cosmic level, this is negligible. In 8 minutes, light travels a distance to Earth, which is 150 million kilometers.
In comparison to other objects, light travels the fastest because it has no mass. It travels 300 000 km/s and it takes a little over 8 minutes to reach the Earth from the Sun. It is the fastest way of traveling, but only radio waves and any other electromagnetic radiation can travel at that speed.
The speed of light is also measured in Astronomical units. That means that light travels 1 Astronomical Unit from the Sun to Earth. The light from the Sun to Saturn needs to travel the distance from 9,5 Astronomical Units, which will take it 79,3 minutes.
If humans were to travel at the speed of light, it would take them 1 hour and 40 minutes to reach Saturn.
NASA offered three ways of reaching the speed of light. The first one is using electric and magnetic fields, that is – electromagnetic fields. Electromagnetic fields push the particles and accelerate them. The same way the gravitational force pulls the objects with mass.
The second method of traveling at a speed light is using magnetic explosions. Magnetic fields are all around us. When they tangle with each other and their tension becomes too strong, they explode. That explosion creates electric fields which then sends the particles flying.
The third way of traveling is by wave-particle interactions. As said before, particles accelerate using electromagnetic fields, which transmit waves. When those waves collide, particles bounce back and forth, similar to a ball bouncing from wall to wall. The more the particles bounce the more speed they gain.
But, even with those theories, humans are not close to traveling at light speed. We are more likely to develop robotic spacecraft that will travel at the speed of light.
Sources:
https://starchild.gsfc.nasa.gov/docs/StarChild/questions/question44.html