Europe is about to undertake one of its grandest ever space missions, to explore the icy moons of Jupiter. The six-tonne spacecraft will make a series of flybys of Callisto, Ganymede and Europa, using an advanced package of instruments to investigate whether any of these worlds are habitable. The European Space Agency (Esa) project team behind Juice held a major review this week and concluded the mission was “go for launch”. Mark the calendar for July 2031. That’s when Juice arrives at Jupiter. It will then conduct 35 flybys of the three moons before settling permanently around Ganymede in late 2034. Where is Jupiter located in reality from the earth ?

