Saturn's iconic rings are not always clearly visible from Earth. NASA / JPL-Caltech / Space Science InstituteOn Sunday afternoon, Saturns iconic rings vanished from our skies.Dont worrythe planets rings are still intact. But from Earths vantage point, a temporary phenomenon called a ring plane crossing is causing them to appear nearly invisible to our eyes.Saturn completes an orbit around the sun every 29.4 years. Because the planet rotates on an axis of 26.7 degrees, our view of its rings changes depending on where the Earth and Saturn are in their orbits. Sometimes, we have a great view of the rings broad surface. In this case, were seeing just their narrow edgeand they reflect so little light that its as though they arent there.They literally almost disappear, says Sean Walker, an associate editor at Sky & Telescope, to Denise Chow at NBC News. Normally you see the rings around Saturn, but when you have an edge-on view, it looks like a hair-thin line of light just cutting across.Need a visual guide? The best way to illustrate this is to get your sheet of paper, and hold it horizontallyparallel to the groundat eye level, astrophysicist Jonti Horner wrote in an article for the Conversation in 2023. Now, move the paper down towards the ground a few inches. What do you see? The upper side of the paper comes into view. Move the paper back up, through your eye line, to hold it above you and you can see the underside of the paper. But as it passes through eye level, the paper will all but disappear. The Hubble Space Telescope captured these two distinct views of Saturn, with a ring plane crossing depicted on the right. Reta Beebe (New Mexico State University), D. Gilmore, L. Bergeron (STScI), NASA/ESA, Amanda S. Bosh (Lowell Observatory), Andrew S. Rivkin (Univ. of Arizona/LPL), the HST High Speed Photometer Instrument Team (R.C. Bless, PI), and NASA/ESAWhen this happens in the solar system, giving Earth the narrowest glimpse of the rings, its known as a ring plane crossing. The phenomenon also offers skywatchers and scientists an opportunity to get a better view of Saturns moons. Many of Saturns moons were actually discovered during ring plane crossings, including its largest, Titan.When we have these ring plane crossings, the light that normally reflects off Saturns rings is no longer glaring back toward Earth, adds Walker to NBC News. That means you can detect a lot more of the smaller moons.Right now, Saturn is near the sun from our perspective, making it tough for astronomers to see it at all. But in September, the planet will reach oppositionan alignment opposite the sun that offers the best time for viewing. The rings will gradually come back into full view, though theyre expected to appear narrow for another short period in November.Ring plane crossings with Saturn happen every 13 to 15 years, so youll have a chance at seeing another one in 2038. At that time, the planet will be much more visible during the phenomenon.After each of these crossings, Saturns disappeared rings will come back. But in millions of years, its rings will be gone forever. The chunks of rock and ice that make up the rings are being pulled into the planet by its gravityscientists call this ring rain.Saturn's Rings Are DisappearingWatch on We estimate that this ring rain drains an amount of water products that could fill an Olympic-sized swimming pool from Saturns rings in half an hour, said James ODonoghue, a planetary scientist previously at NASAs Goddard Space Flight Center, in a 2018 statement.In 2023, researchers estimated Saturns rings have somewhere between 15 million to 400 million years leftbefore they disappear for goodand a second study found they might be much younger than astronomers thought.Considering the planets vast age of roughly four billion years, were quite lucky to see a ring in the first place, Sascha Kempf, aphysicistat the University of Colorado Boulder who led the second study, told Science News Nikk Ogasa at the time.Get the latest stories in your inbox every weekday.Filed Under: Astronomers, Astronomy, NASA, Outer Space, Planets, Saturn, Sky Watching Guide, Solar System, Sun