Figure 7-18 RIVUXG The Changing Appearance of Saturn’s Rings Saturn’s rings are aligned with its equator, which is tilted 27° from Saturn’s orbital plane. As Saturn moves around its orbit, the rings maintain the same orientation in space, so observers on Earth see the rings at various angles. The accompanying Hubble Space Telescope photographs show Saturn at various points in its orbit. Note that the rings seem to disappear entirely when viewed edge-on, which occurs about every 15 years.