Juno just raced by Europa, providing our best look in 20 years at the icy world
Enlarge / The best images we have of Europa were gathered more than two decades ago. (credit: NASA)
On Thursday morning, NASA's Juno spacecraft swooped down to within 358 km of the surface of Europa, the large, ice-encrusted Moon that orbits Jupiter.
This flyby will provide humanity its closest look at Europa since the Galileo mission made several close flybys more than two decades ago. However, the Juno spacecraft will carry a more powerful suite of instruments and a far more capable camera than Galileo. So this should be our best look yet at the intriguing world.
Launched in 2011, Juno reached Jupiter in 2016 to closely study the composition of the Solar System's largest planet, as well as its powerful magnetosphere. After it successfully completed its primary mission in 2021, Juno's mission operators have begun using the probe to assess moons in the Jovian system, including Europa, Ganymede, and Io.