OTD in 1989, the crew of #Atlantis deployed the Galileo probe on a voyage of discovery to giant Jupiter. […]
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Stunning view of Jupiter from the Juno spacecraft. Photo Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/SwRI/MSSS/Gerald Eichstäd/Seán Doran © CC NC SA Jupiter is not known as a water world since it has no oceans, lakes or other kinds of liquid water or ice. It doesn’t even have a solid surface beneath its deep, turbulent atmosphere. But there is […] 
Aerial view of Atlantis’ rise to orbit on 18 October 1989, 30 years ago this week. Photo Credit: NASA Thirty years ago, this week, shuttle mission STS-34 and the crew of Atlantis roared aloft from Pad 39B at the Kennedy Space Center (KSC) in Florida to deliver NASA’s Galileo spacecraft onto the first leg […] 
Mounted atop its Boeing-built Inertial Upper Stage (IUS), Galileo parts company from Space Shuttle Atlantis on the evening of 18 October 1989. Photo Credit: NASA When the Galileo spacecraft drifted out of Space Shuttle Atlantis’ payload bay on the evening of 18 October 1989—30 years ago this week—to begin the first leg of its […] 
Artist’s concept of Europa Clipper during a flyby of Europa. Image Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech NASA’s next mission back to Jupiter’s moon Europa just took another big step towards reality. The next phase of Europa Clipper has been confirmed, giving the go-ahead for the mission to proceed to final design, construction and testing. […] 
Illustration of the Galileo probe at Europa in 1997, and how the plume disrupted the moon’s magnetic field. Image Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/Univ. of Michigan For decades, Jupiter’s moon Europa has fascinated scientists and the public alike after it was learned that a global water ocean lies beneath the icy crust. Could there be life […] 
Crescent Jupiter, with two of its moons, Europa and Io, as seen by Juno during its fifth flyby on March 27, 2017. This is a view never possible from Earth. Image Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/SwRI/MSSS/Roman Tkachenko NASA’s Juno spacecraft has successfully completed its fifth close flyby of Jupiter, gathering more scientific data and sending back […] 
Artist’s conception of the proposed Europa lander, with sampling arm extended. Image Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech For decades now, Europa has beckoned – this moon of Jupiter which is frozen on the outside but hides a global ocean on the inside – has so far only been visited by spacecraft during brief flybys. Scientists and […] 
Artist’s illustrationn of Voyager 1 looking back on the Solar System. Image Credit: NASA/ESA/G. Bacon (STScI) There have been many incredible planetary missions over the past several decades, from as close as our Moon to the outer reaches of the Solar System. Right now, there are robotic explorers at Mars, Jupiter, Saturn, Ceres, […] 
Artist’s conception of Juno orbiting Jupiter. Image Credit: NASA NASA’s Juno spacecraft has been busy orbiting Jupiter and providing fantastic new views of this giant world, something not possible since the previous Galileo mission. While almost flawless so far, the mission has had a few hiccups recently. Juno entered safe mode just shortly […] |
 Launch of SpaceX's Falcon 9 with Starlink 17 has been delayed once again. Currently the new launch date is To Be Determined. Click here for more details...  |
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