I am informed that Saturn's moon Hyperion tumbles chaotically instead of turning on its axis as most other?

Question

planets and moons do. So is that because it is shaped like a giant potato? (That's what it looks like in the picture I saw.) Why is it shaped that way? What would it be like to live on Hyperion? Does it have gravity? Would you get bounced around chaotically? Does it have gravity some times but not others? Is the temperature at the poles different from at the Equator?

Answer 1

Its chaotic tumbling could well be due to its shape. If an object has 3 axes of rotation of different lengths it can rotate in a stable fashion around the longest axis and the shortest axis, but not the middle-sized axis. Try it with a bar of soap. Throw it in the air and try to get it to spin around the axis that isn't the shortest or the longest - it always starts to tumble.



It's surface gravity is only about 1/500 of Earth gravity so it would be very hard to get around. You wouldn't so much walk as make a series of sub-orbital flights. I don't think it rotates fast enough to bounce you around.

Answer 2

Yes, it is because of its shape.



Who knows why it is shaped that way? Maybe two lumpy asteroids merged, or maybe a large asteroid got broken by some impact?



The tumbling period ranges mostly between 6 days to 55 days, and the direction that the poles point to, wanders all over the sky. The orientation on any one orbit has almost nothing to do with the orientation just 42 days later.



Everything has gravity, all the time. The amount of gravity you would feel on Hyperion depends on where you are. It ranges from 0.17% to 0.21% of Earth gravity.



The temperature is about -180 C, depending a bit on how long a you were out in the sunshine. Remember, sometimes the poles point to the sun, but then sometimes they don't for a long time.

Answer 3

Hyperion, like most of the smaller moons and asteroids, is too small to have formed into a sphere. It is the largest of the irregularly shaped moons. It's chaotic rotation is a result of its strange shape, eccentric orbit, and its proximity to the large moon Titan.



EVERY body in the solar system has gravity, and that gravity is constant at any one point on its surface. You would not notice the chaotic rotation on the moon's surface, because it is relatively slow. The temperature anywhere on the surface would vary widely.

Answer 4

Yeah, it is the only moon to behave chaotically, and it is the only moon in the solar system to not be tidally locked. So it is a relatively newcomer to Saturn.