Dragonfly, the first aircraft to explore another world.

Titan is Saturn’s largest moon and the second-largest in the solar system, surpassed only by Ganymede. Its diameter is literally planetary—approximately 5,250 km in radius—making it 50% wider than Earth’s Moon, which has a diameter of 3,475 km, and considerably larger than Mercury, which has a diameter of 4,880 km, In other words, it is considerably larger in size than Mercury, although it is less massive, because Mercury is essentially a ball of metal and rock.

Titan, however, has a lot of water—a great deal of water—and a great many organic compounds; it also has a thick atmosphere and is the only moon with stable liquid bodies on its surface, as well as liquid water beneath it; it also has a liquid ocean beneath its icy surface, but on its surface there are already rivers; it “rains” and “snows”—in quotes—but not water; it “snows” methane and ethane, which are fuels here on Earth, but they don’t burn because Titan’s atmosphere lacks oxygen, and you need oxygen for combustion.

If there were oxygen, there would be a huge problem on Titan. The thing is, all those organic compounds—all that fluid dynamics, with rivers, lakes, and so on—could be conducive to the development of life, although it would have to be a form of life completely different from what we know here on Earth. It would be based on those types of liquids and would function in a much colder temperature range than we have here on Earth, because the landscapes—for example, in the animations, the landscapes we see—there’s water, there’s water everywhere.

Those landscapes will consist mainly of water—in other words, the mountains are essentially made of frozen water. Water on Titan is as abundant as rocks here on Earth, the dunes, the dust, and the sand— those are already organic compounds; the soil—or what would be the soil itself—is organic matter, ranging from literal plastics—there are deserts of powdered plastic—to much more complex and strange organic compounds.

Dragonfly—the mission currently under construction, and this is today’s news—the animations we see don’t really give us a sense of the size of this spacecraft; it’s enormous. It’s a flying rover, and they’re assembling it right now—it’s the size of a car. It’s set to launch no earlier than July 2028—and I mean no earlier than July 2028—because the official text in NASA’s press release states that it will launch no earlier than July 2028.

The launch window is July 5–25, 2028, so if you miss that window, I think you’ll have to wait two years—something like that—so no, there isn’t much more leeway; it’ll have to be in July 2028. Let’s hope there aren’t any setbacks or difficulties, because this mission is crucial—it’s essential. It’s going to reveal a completely different world to us; it’s not a barren, dry place like the Moon—there are rivers and lakes. It’s an epic mission—it’s like sending Curiosity or Perseverance, but in flight.

This mission will arrive in late 2034 or 2035; the journey will take 6 years, and it will operate for approximately 3.3 years. They might extend its mission a bit longer—I hope it lasts at least 3½ years. It’s a nuclear-powered flying drone because, unfortunately, there’s very little solar energy on Titan; the solar radiation that reaches it, the sunlight that reaches Saturn is very scarce, and on Titan—with its layers of clouds—it’s even scarcer. So you need another energy source, and it will operate for those approximately 3.3 years while flying, since it will initially land in a desert-like area to explore those strange moons.

It’s going to explore a wide variety of landscapes thanks to its great flying capability, which will allow it to cover enormous distances—much more than, for example, the rovers on Mars. The record is held, if I’m not mistaken, by Curiosity at 45 km, but it moves very slowly; this one, however, will be able to fly.

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