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1994-01-04
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1/3/93: Planetary Mission Status
PUBLIC INFORMATION OFFICE
JET PROPULSION LABORATORY
CALIFORNIA INSTITUTE OF TECHNOLOGY
NATIONAL AERONAUTICS AND SPACE ADMINISTRATION
PASADENA, CALIF. 91109
PLANETARY MISSION STATUS
January 3, 1994
GALILEO: The spacecraft and Earth are once again approaching
each other, although Galileo continues to recede from the Sun on
its way to Jupiter. The distances are 654 million kilometers
(406 million miles) from Earth, 560 million kilometers (348
million miles) from the Sun. Distance to Earth will reach a
minimum in early May and then start to increase. Playback of
data from Galileo's encounter with the asteroid Ida, begun last
September, will resume in spring 1994 at 40 bits per second (the
rate is now 10 bits per second). Galileo will go into orbit
around Jupiter and relay data from a probe in its atmosphere on
December 7, 1995. Spacecraft condition is excellent, except that
the high-gain antenna is still only partly deployed; the mission
team is planning to use the low-gain antenna for the Jupiter
mission. Galileo was launched October 18, 1989, flew by Venus in
1990 and Earth in 1990 and 1992 for gravity assists, and flew by
the asteroid Gaspra in October 1991 and Ida in August 1993.
MAGELLAN: The spacecraft is in orbit around Venus with altitudes
of 197 to 541 kilometers (122 to 336 miles), and has been mapping
the planet's gravitational field through precision tracking since
the orbit was achieved through aerobraking earlier this year.
Spacecraft condition is very good. Magellan was launched May 4,
1989. It radar-mapped more than 98 percent of Venus's surface
from September 1990 to September 1992.
TOPEX/POSEIDON: The satellite is healthy, and all scientific
instruments are performing normally. The mission is to map
global sea level changes, reflecting seasonal warming and cooling
and winds. TOPEX/Poseidon was launched August 10, 1992.
ULYSSES: The spacecraft is in a highly inclined solar orbit, now
almost 49 degrees south relative to the sun's equator and about
543 million kilometers (337 million miles) from Earth, following
a gravity assist flyby at Jupiter in February 1992. Ulysses will
make solar polar passages (about 80 degrees south and north) in
1994 and 1995. Spacecraft condition and performance are
excellent, with Ulysses gathering data on the heliosphere -- the
realm dominated by the solar wind. The Ulysses spacecraft was
built by the European Space Agency and launched October 6, 1990.
VOYAGER 1 and 2: The two Voyager spacecraft are continuing their
interstellar mission, currently taking data on magnetic fields
and charged particles as well as ultraviolet data. Voyager 1,
launched September 5, 1977, is currently 8.25 billion kilometers
(5.13 billion miles) from Earth after flying by Jupiter and
Saturn in 1979 and 1980. Voyager 2, launched August 20, 1977,
flew by Jupiter (1979), Saturn (1981), Uranus (1986) and Neptune
(1989), and is now 6.41 billion kilometers (3.98 billion miles)
from Earth.
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