Thebe, Moon

Thebe

Union World – Moon of Saturn – Sol System

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First Surface visit and survey in 2099 part of the Saturn Moon Suvey of United Earth. First permanent base in 2102. Voyager One. Extensivley mined for Ice and minerals. Thebe was utilized by the Colorado Mining School and developed into the Thebe School of Interstellar Mining. It has become the most prominent Mining technology and engineering center in  the known Galaxy. Mining companies pay premium salaries for Graduates of this School. Its reputation increased even further  under  its current Dean, a Wurgus, More than 30,000 Students and 1500 Teachers, Instructors and Specialist live and work here every day, plus  Research and Engineering Institutes. Thebe is served via TransMatterTunnel from Sol Hub.

Thebe ( /ˈθiːbiː/ THEE-bee; Greek: Θήβη) also known as Jupiter XIV, is the fourth of Jupiter's moons by distance from the planet. It was discovered by Stephen P. Synnott in images from the Voyager 1 space probe taken on March 5, 1979, while making its flyby of Jupiter. In 1983 it was officially named after the mythological nymph Thebe.

The second largest of the inner satellites of Jupiter, Thebe orbits within the outer edge of the Thebe Gossamer Ring that is formed from dust ejected from its surface. It is irregularly shaped and reddish in colour, and is thought like Amalthea to consist of porous water ice with  amounts of other materials. Its surface features include large craters and high mountains—some of them are comparable to the size of the moon itself.

Thebe was photographed in 1979 and 1980 by the Voyager 1 and 2 spacecraft, and later, in more detail, by the Galileo orbiter in the 1990s. Thebe is irregularly shaped, with the closest ellipsoidal approximation being 116×98×84 km. Its surface area is probably between 31,000 and 59,000 (~45,000) km2. Its bulk density and mass are not known, but assuming that its mean density is like that of Amalthea (around 0.86 g/cm³),its mass can be estimated at roughly 4.3 × 1017 kg.

Similarly to all inner satellites of Jupiter, Thebe rotates synchronously with its orbital motion, thus keeping one face always looking toward the planet. Its orientation is such that the long axis always points to Jupiter. At the surface points closest to and furthest from Jupiter, the surface is thought to be near the edge of the Roche lobe, where Thebe's gravity is only slightly larger than the centrifugal force.As a result, the escape velocity in these two points is very small, thus allowing dust to escape easily after meteorite impacts, and ejecting it into the Thebe Gossamer Ring.[3]

The surface of Thebe is dark and appears to be reddish in color. There is a substantial asymmetry between leading and trailing hemispheres: the leading hemisphere is 1.3 times brighter than the trailing one. The asymmetry is probably caused by the higher velocity and frequency of impacts on the leading hemisphere, which excavate a bright  ice from the interior of the moon. The surface of Thebe is heavily cratered and it appears that there are at least three or four impact craters that are very large, each being roughly comparable in size to Thebe itself. The largest (diameter about 40 km) crater is situated on the side that faces away from Jupiter, and is called Zethus ] There are several bright spots at the rim of this crater, called the Seven Eyes of Thebe and are reflective water ice lakes

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