JUICE Mission to Jupiter Delayed Due to Lightning Warning: European Space Agency

JUICE (Jupiter Icy Moon Explorer)a long-prepared mission under the banner of the European Space Agency (ESA), in which the Czech scientists and companies, was supposed to take off on Thursday at 14:15 CET from the European Cosmodrome in the tropical South American French Guiana. However, the start was canceled shortly before the engines were ignited due to a lightning warning.

Friday’s launch of a launch vehicle with a six-ton ​​payload – a 2.4-ton probe and 3.6 tons of fuel – ESA set for 14:14 CET. And he has already succeeded.

If this launch was interrupted not only by the weather, but also by an unexpected technical fault, the rocket with the probe could try to launch every day for the next two weeks. The next opportunity would not arise until August.

“The launch window is very short, but it repeats every day for at least the next two weeks,” explained Ondřej Santolík from the Space Physics Department of the Institute of Atmospheric Physics of the Academy of Sciences of the Czech Republic on Thursday, who participated in the instrument on the probe that will study electromagnetic waves at Jupiter .

The probe should be separated from the launch vehicle half an hour after launch. Subsequently, giant solar panels with an area of ​​85 square meters will be developed to provide power for scientific instruments and service systems.

JUICE is equipped with ten instruments including optical cameras, spectrometers or electric and magnetic field sensors. The probe will communicate with the Earth using an antenna with a diameter of 2.5 meters. Scientists from the Astronomical Institute of the Academy of Sciences of the Czech Republic participated in the project, for example, and built a prototype of a special power source.

The goal of the mission is to explore the Jupiter planetary system and its three icy moons. Europa, Callisto and the giant Ganymede, according to scientists, hide oceans under the icy crust that could potentially be the place for the origin of life.

In the first stages of its journey, JUICE will circle the Earth, the Moon and Venus several times, which it will use for a gravitational maneuver. This will give her the speed needed to reach Jupiter. It will move around our planet until 2029.

Between 2031 and 2034, it is expected to begin fulfilling the main goal of its mission, i.e. the exploration of the Jupiter system and its three moons, which it will fly by up to 35 times. In 2035, it will “luxuriate” in the orbit of Ganymede, the largest moon in the Solar System. By impacting its surface, it will end its mission.

ESA has been working on the project of the first European probe to explore Jupiter since the beginning of the last decade. The mission cost approximately 1.6 billion euros (37.6 billion CZK). According to ESA, over 2,000 people from 23 countries participated in the development and testing of the probe and equipment.