Clipper Sets Sail for an Ocean Millions of Miles Away

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By Kimberly M. S. Cartier, Eos/AGU. 

Excerpt: Europa Clipper launched at 12:06 pm EDT on 14 October from NASA’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida. Clipper successfully deployed its solar panels and communicated with mission control once in space. ...NASA’s Europa Clipper spacecraft...will head to Jupiter’s icy moon Europa and determine whether it’s a hospitable place for life. ...There will be 49 flybys of Europa to study the moon from pole to pole ...The craft is set to arrive at Jupiter in April 2030. ...Europa is one of Jupiter’s four Galilean moons. Past missions to the Jovian system discovered that Europa, along with fellow icy moons Ganymede and Callisto, have vast liquid water oceans sloshing around beneath icy shells. “Ocean worlds have been considered potentially habitable environments for a while,” said Monica Vidaurri, a doctoral student in planetary modeling at Stanford University in California. “This is the first time we’re really dedicating a spacecraft to [exploring] it.” Europa Clipper aims to measure the thickness of the ice shell, analyze the composition of the surface and any outgassed material, and characterize the geology. The craft is equipped with nine scientific instruments that will work together to answer these questions.... 

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