Juno mission
On Sunday, Dec. 11, at 9:04 a.m. PST (12:04 p.m. EST, 17:04 UTC) NASA’s Juno spacecraft finished its third flyby over Jupiter’s mysterious cloud tops.
This is the first of a series of posts pointing out features of interest in the perijove-3 images.
This is the third in a row orbiting Jupiter flyby, after entering its orbit.
View the latest pictures, you can also find here and processed images.
The spacecraft team continues to weigh its options regarding modifications of Juno’s orbital period — how long it takes for the spacecraft to complete one orbit around Jupiter. At present, Juno’s orbital period is 53.4 days. There had been plans to perform a period reduction maneuver with the spacecraft’s main engine on Oct. 19 to reduce the orbital period to 14 days. The team made the decision to forgo the maneuver in order to further study the performance of a set of valves that are part of the spacecraft’s fuel pressurization system.
“We have a healthy spacecraft that is performing its mission admirably, and we are able to obtain great science every time we fly by,” said Rick Nybakken, project manager for Juno from NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, California. “What we do not want to do is add any unnecessary risk, so we are moving forward carefully.”
NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, California, manages the Juno mission for the principal investigator, Scott Bolton, of Southwest Research Institute in San Antonio, Texas. The Juno mission is part of the New Frontiers Program managed by NASA’s Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville, Alabama for the Science Mission Directorate. Lockheed Martin Space Systems, Denver, Colorado, built the spacecraft. JPL is a division of Caltech in Pasadena, California. Source
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