The record-breaking solar-powered Juno spacecraft has survived its toughest test so far and is now in orbit around Jupiter.
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Rick Nybakken, Juno’s project manager, ripped up the mission’s in-case-anything-and-everything-goes-wrong contingency plan, the Post reported. They don’t need that.
He said: “It’s because we were involved in theoretical studies of Jupiter’s environment and had produced a research paper that was published in 2011, which has become the definitive model of how we think Jupiter’s auroras are actually generated”.
“All stations on Juno co-ord, we have the tone for burn cut-off on Delta B”, Juno Mission Control had announced.
Some things we should learn from Juno include: How much water is in Jupiter’s atmosphere, whether it has a solid core, and whats going on deep inside its clouds.
There is also the mystery of the planet’s “Great Red Spot”. Michael Watkins, who took over as director of JPL on Friday, said that he had mixed feelings after receiving confirmation that Juno had entered its target planet’s orbit. This critical braking maneuver allowed Jupiter to yank the craft out of its orbit around the sun and pull it into its own embrace. But with its three solar panels open, it spans about 66 feet (20 meters). It travelled a roundabout route of 1.74billion miles because it needed to be fired like a slingshot by the Earth’s gravity to reach its destination. That meant the craft had to do it alone, relying on preprogrammed instructions.
The Juno video is a shout-out of sorts to one of history’s greatest scientists. As a result, Juno was flying blind. “And it’s nearly like a dream coming true right here”. The stunningly surreal sequence shows the four Galilean moons surrounding the planet. Juno’s scientific exploration of Jupiter expands the frontiers of knowledge and advances the peaceful exploration of outer space.
“NASA did it again”, said an elated Scott Bolton, Juno’s principal investigator. He called the circular dance of the moons around the planet an example of “true harmony in nature”. The orbit will be extremely elliptical – Juno will get as close as 3,100 miles to the planet (closer than any probe has ever been) and as far as a 1 million miles away.
Preplanned events leading up to the orbital insertion engine burn included changing the spacecraft’s attitude to point the main engine in the desired direction and then increasing the spacecraft’s rotation rate from 2 to 5 revolutions per minute (RPM) to help stabilize it.
“Independence Day always is something to celebrate, but today we can add to America’s birthday another reason to cheer – Juno is at Jupiter”, NASA administrator Charlie Bolden said in a statement.
More than anything, the scientists telegraphed relief that – for the time being – all had gone as planned.
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“(We’re all) going to bed tonight not worrying about what’s gonna happen tomorrow, it’s pretty wonderful”, said Diane Brown, an executive for the Juno program.
