To Jupiter Again

Yesterday I happened to pass by one of the TVs at work forever tuned to a local news channel in time to see footage of an Ariane rocket blasting off. Pausing to watch, I heard an explanation this was the launch of the Jupiter Icy Moons Explorer, or “JUICE.” I’d been aware of a probe to Jupiter with that amusingly abbreviated name (for all that I’m tempted to imagine some of the letters uncapitalized), but had managed to miss the launch being scheduled. The impression this was a European foray beyond the asteroid belt (and solar-powered, too) could have helped explain that, if only in part. I checked my RSS reader after getting back from work but didn’t notice any obvious headlines from the BBC site. It took until this morning to find a link on the front page of Wikipedia, and in the meantime I’d managed to notice a report the Ingenuity mini-helicopter has managed fifty flights on Mars, ten times as many as the more hopeful early plans had imagined. The little solar panel atop its rotors really does seem able to do more than just stretch out an initial charge. Given the understanding JUICE will take eight years to spiral out to Jupiter via gravity assists, though, it seems likely enough its closeups from there will at best overlap with hypothetical future flying machines on Mars.