Scientists discover Titan's methane rainstorms are more intense than expected

Saturn's largest moon, Titan, has liquid rain, rivers and seas much like Earth, except its clouds are made of methane rather than water vapour. Planetary scientists studying the moon found that its rainstorms are far more extreme than anyone had anticipated. Vast stretches of the moon sit dry for long spells before being struck by short, intense downpours capable of dumping over a foot of rain in a single day. This pattern of prolonged drought followed by sudden, violent rainfall appears to be reshaping Titan's icy surface in ways that closely resemble how flash floods carve the deserts of Earth and Mars.Alluvial fans reveal where Titan's most intense rainstorms strikeCassini's radar mapping showed that Titan's surface is divided along clear lines: dunes dominate the lower latitudes, while lakes and seas cluster nearer the poles. The research team identified alluvial fans, cone-shaped deposits left behind when sudden flows of sediment spread across low ground, concentrated between 50 and 80 degrees latitude. These fans sit closer to the poles than to the equator, suggesting that the pattern of rainfall varies significantly across different regions of the moon.This distribution poin...