China News Service, June 9th. On June 7th local time, NASA's "Juneo" spacecraft flew over Jupiter's largest satellite Ganymede at high speed, and sent back the first in 20 years. A batch of "close-up photos".
Image source: NASA's official website
According to Taiwan’s United News Network, the closest distance between the Juno and Ganymede is less than 1,038 kilometers.
NASA released the first two black-and-white photos on the 8th. One highlights the impact craters on the surface of Ganymede and the long and narrow features that may be related to structural faults.
Scott Bolton, the chief scientist of Juno and a scholar at the Southwest Research Institute (SwRI), said, “This is the closest time any spacecraft has approached this huge satellite in an entire generation. We will take it slowly. Until we come to any scientific conclusions. But until then, we can only admire this extra-terrestrial spectacle, which is the only moon in the solar system larger than Mercury."
Ganymede is one of the 79 known moons of Jupiter. It was discovered by the Italian astronomer Galileo in 1610. The last spacecraft that came so close to Ganymede was the Galileo that passed by in 2000.