This was the breakthrough maneuver that redirected the probe towards Jupiter

2024-08-22 01:32:18

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The juice space probe it managed to pass between the Moon and the Earth, a delicate maneuver to gain momentum and launch itself towards Jupiter, the European Space Agency (ESA) announced yesterday.

Juice, launched into space last April, touched down with the Moon on August 19, shortly after 21:00 GMT (Greenwich Mean Time), and then fly over Southeast Asia and the Pacific Ocean, shortly before 22:00 GMT the following day, at an altitude of less than 7,000 km.

The operation It involves getting close to a celestial body to take advantage of its gravitational pull, a natural force that allows the spacecraft’s trajectory to be diverted and its speed to be modified, accelerated or slowed down.

“The gravity-assisted flight was flawless, everything went perfectly, and we were excited to see Juice back so close to Earth,” Ignacio Tanco, director of spacecraft operations for the mission, said in a statement.

The flyby required ultra-precise real-time navigation, but the mission is saving about 100-150kg of fuel. In the month before the transition, Juice was given sweet points by the spaceship operators. to put him directly on the right path to it. They then tracked the probe 24/7 between August 17 and 22.

The Ariane 5 rocket that sent Juice into space was not powerful enough to propel the probe directly into the vastness of the solar system, about 800 million kilometers from Earth.

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Many space missions have already used this method, known as gravitational assistance, but the Moon flight together with the Earth one was “a world first,” ESA emphasizes.

The maneuver caused the probe to accelerate slightly as it approached the Moon before braking more strongly near Earth, and above all changing direction towards Venus, where it will arrive in 2025.

It will then return to Earth for two more flybys in 2026 and 2029, before reaching Jupiter in July 2031.

Juice will then be able to observe its icy moons, Europa, Ganymede and Callisto, in search of environments conducive to the emergence of ester life.

The Moon-Earth maneuver was able to be executed after experts introduced small trajectory corrections during the previous month.