Today, the European Space Agency (ESA) is launching the first European mission to Jupiter. The Jupiter Icy Moons Explorer, also known as JUICE, aims to provide new insights into the Jupiter system by focusing on Jupiter’s three icy moons Europa, Ganymede and Callisto.
The mission will be active for the next eight years. This will be a period that will include the passage of Earth (the last in 2029), one of which will include Venus and the asteroid 223 Rosa in the main Asteroid Belt. In July 2031, it will first pass Ganymede and then enter an orbit around Jupiter.
The spacecraft will pass Europa twice, Ganymede 12 times and Callisto 21 times. Callisto has the oldest surface in the Solar System and may also have a liquid ocean. If there is one, JUICE will find it.
When JUICE finally orbits its primary target, Ganymede, it will be the first spacecraft to orbit a moon other than our own. Ganymede is the largest and only magnetic field satellite in the Solar System, and JUICE will devote the second part of its mission to investigating its potential habitability.
The 2030s will bring new insights into the Jupiter system and perhaps even evidence that life could or does exist elsewhere in the Solar System.
Dr Olivier Witasse, a planetary scientist working on the scientific aspects of the mission, said: “We have two big topics for the JUICE mission. The first is to study what we call habitable places. Are there places around a planet like Jupiter that have habitable conditions or interesting conditions for life? We have some good evidence that some of the icy moons have a lot of liquid under their surface,” he said. “The solar system. We want to understand the system as a whole. And maybe we’ll have some kind of model for exoplanets and extrasolar systems.”
Watch the launch of ESA’s JUICE mission live
The Ariane V rocket carrying JUICE will be launched from Europe’s spaceport in French Guiana at 15:15 Turkey time today and will be broadcast live by the European Space Agency. You can watch the live broadcast in the video below.
Click to watch from ESA’s own website…
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