Juno Flyby of Ganymede and Jupiter

Astronomy Picture of the Day · 2025-12-14 · NASA (public domain)

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What would it be like to fly over the largest moon in the Solar System ? In 2021, the robotic Juno spacecraft flew past Jupiter 's huge moon Ganymede and took images that have been digitally constructed into a detailed flyby. As the featured video begins, Juno swoops over the two-toned surface of the 5,000-km wide moon, revealing an icy alien landscape filled with grooves and craters. The grooves are likely caused by shifting surface plates, while the craters are caused by violent impacts . Continuing on in its orbit, Juno then performed its 34th close pass over Jupiter's clouds. The digitally-constructed video shows numerous swirling clouds in the north, colorful planet-circling zones and bands across the middle -- featuring several white-oval cloud s from the String of Pearls , and finally more swirling clouds in the south.

Astronomy Picture of the Day for 2025-12-14 — image & explanation courtesy of NASA (public domain), mirrored at Tukuk-OS for reading and search convenience.

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