Juice spacecraft fully stretched out and ready for cruising to Jupiter

The European Space Agency has completed the deployment of its Jupiter Icy Moons Explorer (Juice), preparing the spacecraft for an ambitious mission to Jupiter and its moons.

Launched in April 2023, Juice will make detailed observations of Jupiter, the largest planet in our solar system, and three of its largest ocean-bearing moons - Ganymede, Callisto and Europa.

On Friday, May 26, ESA said that the Flight Control Team has deployed all the solar panels, antennas, probes and booms that were tucked away safely during launch. Each of these antennas and booms carry part or all of some of the spacecraft's 10 instruments.

By positioning these instruments at a significant distance from Juice, they are effectively isolated from the spacecraft's electric and magnetic fields.

"Accompanying our views from the monitoring cameras, confirmation that everything deployed as planned also came from the instruments themselves. The teams behind some of the instruments have been switching them on and making measurements to check that everything is working well. Teams have already confirmed that Juice's RPWI, JANUS, J-MAG and GALA instruments, as well as the RADEM radiation monitor, are ready for Jupiter," the agency said in a statement on Friday.

"We have faced and overcome various challenges to get Juice into the right shape for getting the best science out of its trip to Jupiter," said Angela Dietz, deputy spacecraft operations manager for the mission.

🆕 With all deployments complete, Juice is fully stretched out and ready for cruising to Jupiter 🥳Discover more details, GIFs and infographics, as well as science data from Juice's newly switched-on instruments 👉 https://t.co/sgyAePYhcm https://t.co/fao8EjeBb2

— ESA's Juice mission (@ESA_JUICE) May 26, 2023

In the coming weeks, more of Juice's 10 instruments will be activated and undergo thorough testing. The objective is to ensure that by mid-July, all instruments are functioning perfectly, preparing the spacecraft for its voyage to Jupiter.

In August 2024, Juice will execute the world's first-ever lunar-Earth gravity assist. This intricate maneuver involves a gravity-assist flyby of the Moon, followed merely 1.5 days later by a similar manoeuvre around Earth. By employing this technique, the spacecraft will conserve a substantial amount of propellant on its journey.