It’s a chance for us to explore not a world that might have been habitable billions of years ago, but a world that might be habitable today — right now,
The mass spectrometer and dust detector data will show whether Europa harbors the composition and chemistry required to host life,
The instruments work together hand in hand to answer our most pressing questions about Europa,
Its sights are set on Jupiter’s ice-encased moon Europa, which the spacecraft will fly by 49 times, coming as close as 16 miles (25 kilometres) from the surface as it searches for ingredients of life.”
We’ll definitely get the thickness of the ice crust and whether there are little ponds in there,
We are looking for a habitable environment,
So, every six times that Europa goes around Jupiter, or every 21 days, we’ll be in the exact spot in the universe to be right next to Europa,
If we were to just go into orbit around Europa and study it, the radiation would likely kill off even the most radiation-hardened electronics within one to two months,
I’ve only actually been on this mission for 2½ years. I didn’t start on it,