Paris. 14th of April. INTERFAX - The Ariane V heavy-class launch vehicle successfully launched the JUICE (Jupiter ICy moons Explorer) automatic interplanetary station into orbit on Friday The European Space Agency (ESA), which is heading to Jupiter to study its three natural satellites, said the operator company Arianespace.
ESA reported that communication was established with the station, telemetry data began to arrive after the launch into orbit.
The launch of a rocket with a station weighing six tons and the size of a bus was carried out from the Kourou cosmodrome in French Guiana at 09:14 local time (at 15:14 Moscow time). The probe was launched into an orbit with a height of 1.5 thousand km, from where it began an independent flight to the largest planet in the Solar System.
As part of the mission, the ESA interplanetary station will explore Jupiter's three largest icy moons - Europa, Ganymede and Callisto. According to astronomers, oceans of liquid water are hiding under their icy surface. The JUICE mission is to study the moons for the potential for life in their oceans, their surface, as well as the atmosphere and the rings surrounding Jupiter.
The station should reach Jupiter in July 2031, where it will make a series of flights near Europa and Callisto, and in December 2034 it will enter an orbit 500 km high around the largest natural satellite in the Solar system Ganymede, the study of which is of the greatest interest to scientists. The scientific mission near Jupiter and its moons is designed for about 3.5 years. It will end in September 2035, when the station will have to crash into the icy surface of Ganymede.
