Images captured by NASA's Cassini spacecraft of Saturn's northern hemisphere include photos of a strange hexagon-shaped jet stream encircling a storm.

According to a report by NASA, , which will include 20 orbits around the planet before it skims past the outer edges of the planet's main rings.

These latest images were captured Dec. 2 and 3. Over the course of the next four months, Cassini will capture some of the closest-ever views of the outer rings and small moons that orbit the planet.

(NASA/JPL-Caltech/Space Science Institute)

At a Glance

The spacecraft Cassini has begun its final mission at Saturn.Images captured from the planet's northern hemisphere show a strange hexagon-shaped jet stream.At the center of the jet stream lies a storm.

"This is it, the beginning of the end of our historic exploration of Saturn. Let these images -- and those to come -- remind you that we’ve lived a bold and daring adventure around the solar system’s most magnificent planet," said Carolyn Porco, Cassini imaging team lead at Space Science Institute, Boulder, Colorado.

The orbits will continue until April 22, notes NASA, when the last close flyby of Saturn's moon Titan will "begin its Grand Finale, leaping over the rings and making the first of 22 plunges through the 1,500-mile-wide gap between Saturn and its innermost ring on April 26."

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Cassini's last hurrah comes on Sept. 15 when the spacecraft takes its final dive into Saturn's atmosphere, during which it will transmit data about the atmosphere's composition until its signal is ultimately lost.

This collage of images from NASA's Cassini spacecraft shows Saturn's northern hemisphere and rings as viewed with four different spectral filters. Each filter is sensitive to different wavelengths of light and reveals clouds and hazes at different altitudes.

(NASA/JPL-Caltech/Space Science Institute)

Cassini, which was , has made a slew of dramatic discoveries since its arrival in 2004, including , and liquid methaneseas onanother moon."

It has been an expensive mission. According to NASA, ; $710 million mission operations; $54 million tracking; $422 million launch vehicle; $500 million ESA; $160 million ASI; total about $3.27 billion, of which U.S. contribution is $2.6 billion and European partners' contribution $660 million.

MORE ON WEATHER.COM: Images From Saturn

Saturn Hurricane

NASA's Cassini spacecraft snapped this view of a monster hurricane at Saturn's North Pole. The eye of the cyclone is 1,250 miles across. That's 20 times larger than the typical eye of a hurricane here on Earth. The hurricane is believed to have been there for years. (AP Photo/NASA/JPL-Caltech/SSI)