First-ever Jupiter mission for ESA, JUICE set to go live today; Check time, how to watch online
In just a few hours from now, the first-ever Jupiter mission for Europe will take off. The mission, which is called the Jupiter Icy Moons Explorer (JUICE), is being led by the European Space Agency (ESA). The spacecraft will study three of Jupiter's Galilean moons — Ganymede, Callisto, and Europa — in search of water and signs of life on them. The spacecraft will take about seven and a half years to reach the gas giant and will begin its exploration in 2031. If you want to know the time of the JUICE mission launch and how to watch it live online, check the details below.
The ESA JUICE mission is set to launch on April 13 at 1215 GMT (8:15 AM EDT, 5:45 PM IST). The liftoff will take place from pad ELA-3 in Europe's Spaceport in Kourou, French Guiana. Interestingly, the rocket which will deploy the spacecraft into space, Ariane 5, also launched the NASA James Webb Space Telescope.
As per ESA, the primary objective of the JUICE missions is to make detailed observations of Jupiter and its three large ocean-bearing moons with a suite of remote sensing, geophysical and in-situ instruments. The mission will characterize these moons as both planetary objects and possible habitats, explore Jupiter's complex environment in-depth, and study the wider Jupiter system as an archetype for gas giants across the Universe. It will conduct 35 Jovian moon flybys.
The spacecraft will carry as many as 10 instruments to collect data from the gas giant. The notable among them include Jovis, Amorum ac Natorum Undique Scrutator (JANUS), a camera system that has 13 panchromatic, broad, and narrow-band filters in the 0.36-micrometer to 1.1-micrometer range, and provides stereo imaging capabilities as well as Moons and Jupiter Imaging Spectrometer
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