A planetary plunge, by Jove.The Galileo spacecraft spacecraft Vehicle designed to operate, with or without a crew, in a controlled flight pattern above Earth's lower atmosphere. Since streamlining is not needed in the high vacuum of this environment, a spacecraft's shape is designed according to its mission (see ended an 8-year tour of Jupiter and its moons on Sept. 21, when it dove into the planet's atmosphere, as scientists had planned. Minutes after the craft disintegrated, Earth received Galileo's swan song, a radio signal suggesting that rocky debris lies along the orbit of the small Jovian moon Almalthea. During its sojourn, Galileo overcame several obstacles, notably the failure of a main communications antenna. The craft took the first close-up portraits of Jupiter's four largest moons: Io, Ganymede, Europa, and Callisto. In 1995, a Galileo probe parachuted into Jupiter. Data from several flybys of Europa suggested that the icy moon Icy moons are believed to be a common class of planetoids that have a surface mostly of ice, possibly with an ocean under the ice, and possibly including a rocky core of silicate or metallic rocks. The prototype of this class of object is Europa. hides a vast ocean. That finding ultimately dictated dic·tate v. dic·tat·ed, dic·tat·ing, dic·tates v.tr. 1. To say or read aloud to be recorded or written by another: dictate a letter. 2. a. how Galileo would die. To make sure that the aging craft wouldn't crash into a body that might harbor lifE, scientists 2 years ago put Galileo on a collision course collision course n. A course, as of moving objects or opposing philosophies, that will end in a collision or conflict if left unchanged: two planes on a collision course; dissidents on a collision course with the regime. with the planet it had explored so intimately. |
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