European Jupiter probe regains contact!
I almost forgot, Europe has another advanced probe on its way to Jupiter.
August 26, U.S. "Space News" reported.
The most advanced interplanetary probe of Europe lost contact with Earth for nearly a full day before its critical Venus flyby on August 31.
The European Space Agency's Juice spacecraft was launched on April 2023 from French Guiana on an Ariane 5 rocket.
The probe's destination is the Jupiter system, where it will study this gas giant and three of its four Galilean moons.
JUICE (Jupiter Icy Moon Explorer) will arrive at its target in July 2031, using four planetary gravity assists to catapult it into the outer solar system.
The second flyby will occur this Sunday, during which JUICE will make a close pass by Venus.
However, the communication failure last month complicated the preparations for this encounter, as the probe unexpectedly lost contact.
"Losing contact with the spacecraft is one of the worst scenarios we could face," said Angela Dietz, the Juice spacecraft operations manager, in an ESA statement on August 25.
JUICE is currently about 200 million kilometers away from Earth, on the opposite side of the Sun.
At that distance, information between Earth and JUICE takes 22 minutes for a round trip.
Within 20 hours, mission operators attempted six transmissions before successfully forcing the alignment of JUICE's medium-gain antenna.
After re-establishing communication, the spacecraft's condition was found to be good.
Original article: www.toutiao.com/article/1841555698419722/
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