A new video posted on YouTube helps to take into account the size of the moons of Jupiter, the largest planet in the solar system, by comparing them with New York City and then with the entire Earth.
In 2019, a team confirmed the presence of twelve new satellites around Jupiter, bringing the total number of Jupiter moons to 79. The planet therefore ranks second in the ranking of the largest number of moons after Saturn and its 82 satellites confirmed.
Among these objects are the Galilean moons, which are the four largest natural satellites of Jupiter: Io, Europa, Ganymede and Callisto. Beside it, the others pale in comparison. Twelve of them are more than ten kilometers in diameter, twenty-six between three and ten kilometers in diameter, while the rest are less than two kilometers.
All of these moons therefore vary considerably in size. To make us understand this better, the chain MetaBall Studios posted a video comparing their size to those of New York City.
As you can see, while dozens of moons are small enough to crush only part of Manhattan, the planet’s four Galilean moons are much larger, ranging in diameter fromapproximately 3121 km for Europe to 5268 km to Ganymedethe largest moon in the solar system.
Three major missions in preparation
Europe in particular has long fascinated researchers. And for good reason, a huge global ocean would be nestled there under several kilometers of ice. This indeed one of the most interesting goals in our search for extraterrestrial life in the solar system, with Mars and Enceladus.
To learn more, NASA is preparing its Europa Clipper mission, scheduled for launch in 2024 aboard a SpaceX’s Falcon Heavy rocket. The spacecraft will arrive on site before the end of the decade and will perform several dozen low-altitude flyovers over Europe. The European Space Agency (ESA) is also preparing a major mission called Jupiter’s frozen moons explorer (or JUICE), scheduled to launch in 2023. The mission will study the four frozen moons of Galilee, but will focus primarily on Ganymede.
Finally, we recently learned that China wants kill two birds with one stone with the launch of two spacecraft aboard a single rocket. A first probe will rub against Uranuswhile the second will focus on Jupiter, before entering orbit around Callisto.
