On path to Jupiter, European Agency’s ‘Juice’ spacecraft gets nudge from Moon, Earth

BERLIN(Germany):  A European Space Agency-led spacecraft, with the mission to explore Jupiter and its three icy moons, will on August 19 fly extremely close past the moon and a day later past the Earth itself.

Scheduled to fly past Earth on August 19-20, the spacecraft will come within 6,800 kilometres of our planet, providing a rare opportunity for people in people in countries in Southeast Asia and the Pacific Ocean getting a chance to catch a fleeting glimpse of it, through the help of powerful binoculars or telescopes.

“Our fearless traveller is getting a nudge from the Moon and Earth,” said the official X feed for JUICE or Jupiter Icy Moons explorer mission that was launched on April 14, last year and is projected to arrive at Jupiter on July 2031.

Led by European countries, Japan, Israel and the United States are also part of one of the largest international outer solar system explorer missions in history which is aimed at exploring the possibilities of life in space and the origins of Jupiter.

The flyby Earth on August 20 will be the first of four flybys that will put the single orbital spacecraft with no lander on the right path to arrive at Jupiter.

JUICE will then spend at least four years making detailed observations of the giant gaseous planet and three of its largest moons, Ganymede, Callisto and Europa.

JUICE’s flyby of the Moon and then of the Earth known as a Lunar-Earth gravity assist (LEGA), is touted as a “world first.” During the “braking” manoeuvre, flight controllers will guide the spacecraft first past the Moon and then past Earth itself in a shortcut to Jupiter via Venus.

This feat will also help the spacecraft save a significant amount of propellant.

JUICE was launched from Europe’s Spaceport in Kourou, French Guiana, on an Ariane 5 launcher and will reach Jupiter in July 2031
Jupiter has three icy moons- Europa, Ganymede, and Callisto – whose surfaces are covered with solid ice but seem to have liquid water ocean below.

The spacecraft will arrive at Jupiter in December 2031 and will spend three years orbiting the planet and making close flybys of three of its main moons: Europa, Ganymede and Callisto. The probe will then move into orbit around the largest moon, Ganymede. Incidentally, Jupiter has around 95 moons!

Six months before entering orbit around Jupiter, JUICE will begin its nominal science phase and then spend months orbiting Jupiter, completing fly-bys of Europa, Ganymede and Callisto, and finally conducting an orbital tour of Ganymede.

Ganymede is the largest moon in the solar system and is the only moon in the solar system to have its own magnetic field like the Earth.

According to the ESA, JUICE is using the gravity of other planets to carefully adjust its trajectory through space and ensure it arrives at Jupiter with the right speed and direction.

“Jupiter is on average 800 million km away from Earth. Without an enormous rocket, sending JUICE straight to the giant planet would require an impossible 60 000 kg of onboard propellant. And then JUICE would need to be carrying an enormous additional amount of propellant to slow itself down enough to go into orbit around Jupiter once it arrives, rather than simply zipping straight past and off into outer space,” the ESA explained.

JUICE’s Spacecraft Operations Manager, Ignacio Tanco said, “It’s like passing through a very narrow corridor, very, very quickly: pushing the accelerator to the maximum when the margin at the side of the road is just millimetres.”

From August 17-22, JUICE will be “in continuous contact with ground stations around the world.”

“Every second of the way, through day and night, operators will keep a careful watch on the data coming down from JUICE, making any tiny adjustments needed to keep the spacecraft on the right course,” the ESA said.

The JUICE is also carrying 10 science instruments onboard and as per the ESA it will be activating the instruments as it passes by the Moon and Earth.

Meanwhile, two monitoring cameras onboard JUICE will click photographs throughout the Moon-Earth flyby. (ANI)