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Space Topics: JupiterVoyager Images of Jupiter and Its MoonsVoyager 1 flew by Jupiter on March 5, 1979, taking more than 18,000 images of planet and its moons. Voyager 2 flew by Jupiter on July 9, 1979, taking about the same number. Between the two Voyager spacecraft, three new moons and a thin, dark ring were discovered. Voyager images of Jupiter's moon Io revealed active volcanoes, the first ever discovered on another body besides Earth.
This image of Jupiter was captured on January 9, 1979 by Voyager 1, 54 million kilometers (34 million miles) from a March 5 closest approach.
This photo of Jupiter was taken by Voyager 1 on the evening of March 1, 1979, from a distance of 4.3 million kilometers (2.7 million miles). The photo shows Jupiter's Great Red Spot (top) and one of the white ovals that can be seen in Jupiter's atmosphere.
Jupiter, its Great Red Spot, and three of its four largest satellites are visible in this photo taken February 5, 1979 by Voyager 1. The spacecraft was 28.4 million kilometers (17.5 million miles) from the planet at the time. The innermost large satellite, Io, can be seen against Jupiter's disk. To the right of Jupiter is the satellite Europa. The darkest satellite, Callisto, is barely visible at the bottom left of the picture.
Jupiter and its four planet-size moons -- Io (upper left), Europa (center),
Ganymede (lower center), and Callisto (lower right) -- were photographed
in early March 1979 by Voyager 1 and assembled into this collage. The moons
and planet are not shown to scale.
Jupiter's faint ring system is shown in this color composite as two light
orange lines protruding from the left side of Jupiter's limb. This picture
was taken in Jupiter's shadow through orange and violet filters. The Voyager
2 spacecraft was at a range of 1,450,000 kilometers (900,000 miles), and about
2 degrees below the plane of the ring.
This photo from Voyager 2 was taken on June 9, 1979 and is centered over the
long-lived disturbed region west of the Great Red Spot. The white oval to the
lower left of the Great Red Spot has a similar chaotic region of clouds to
its west. At the time this composite was taken the spacecraft was more than
24 million kilometers (15 million miles) from Jupiter. By the time of Voyager
2's closest approach to Jupiter on July 9, 1979 this oval had moved to just
south of the Red Spot.
This mosaic of Europa was produced from images taken by Voyager 2. The view is centered at about the 300 degree meridian. The most unusual features in Voyager's images were the systems of long linear structures that crossed the surface in various directions. Some of these linear structures are over 1,000 kilometers (about 620 miles) long and about 2 or 3 kilometers (1 to 2 miles) wide.
Voyager 2 took this picture of Ganymede as the spacecraft was nearing its encounter with the ice giant. It was taken from a range of 312,000 kilometers (195,000 miles), and it shows features down to about 5 to 6 kilometers across. Bright lanes of grooves cross darker patches. Some of the darker patches seem to have moved left-to-right with respect to each other, the first observed example of "strike-slip" tectonic motion seen anywhere outside of Earth.
This Voyager 1 image of Io shows the active volcanic plume of Loki on the limb. A heart-shaped feature southeast of Loki consists of fallout deposits from the active plume Pele. The images that make up this mosaic were taken from an average distance of approximately 490,000 kilometers (340,000 miles). |
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