I will never get tired of space probe images. Four centuries after Galileo gazed through his crude telescope and saw Jupiter being circled by a number of its own moons (thus dealing a serious blow to the Ptolemaic, Earth-centric view of the cosmos), NASA’s Juno probe captured the higher-fidelity view above of the Galilean satellites orbiting the giant planet as it approached its own orbit.
During it’s final approach to Jupiter, NASA’s Juno spacecraft captured this unique time-lapse movie of the Galilean satellites in motion about the planet. The images were taken 5 days prior to arrival and end when the spacecraft was 3 million miles distant. The innermost moon is volcanic Io; next in line is the ice-crusted ocean world Europa, followed by massive Ganymede, and finally, heavily cratered Callisto.
Imagine the look on Galileo’s face if you could go back and show him that video…
