NASA’s Juno spacecraft will fly past Jupiter’s volcanic moon Io on Tuesday, May 16, and then the gas giant itself soon after. The flyby of the Jovian moon will be the closest to date, at an altitude of about 22,060 miles (35,500 kilometers). Now in the third year of its extended mission to investigate the interior of Jupiter, the solar-powered spacecraft will also explore the ring system where some of the gas giant’s inner moons reside.
To date, Juno has performed 50 flybys of Jupiter and also collected data during close encounters with three of the four Galilean moons – the icy worlds Europa and Ganymede, and fiery Io.
“Io is the most volcanic celestial body that we know of in our solar system,” said Scott Bolton, Juno principal investigator from the Southwest Research Institute in San Antonio. “By observing it over time on multiple passes, we can watch how the volcanoes vary – how often they erupt, how bright and hot they are, whether they are linked to a group or solo, and if the shape of the lava flow changes.”
