Today on Galileo - November 6, 1996
Today marks Galileo's closest approach in this orbit to Io (240,000 km), Jupiter (9 Jupiter radius lengths away), Europa (34,000 km), and Ganymede (1,050,000 km). This is the closest Galileo will get to Io for the rest of Galileo's scheduled tour of Jupiter, so most of today's study will focus on close looks of Io by the imaging camera and extensive studies by NIMS looking for sulfur dioxide and PPR mapping surface temperatures. Global coverage of measurements will be made at Europa throughout the day, looking primarily for any signs of icy volcanism. Evidence for this might be found with the NIMS instrument, which will look for hydroxyl (OH) in the atmosphere.
Also, images of Jupiter's third and fourth moons out, Amalthea and Thebe, will be taken today at 8 km (5 miles)/pixel resolution. Amalthea is 135 kilometers (84 miles) across, and Thebe thought to be 50 kilometers (30 miles) wide, but this data will tell us more.