ESA’s JUICE Probe Uses Venus Flyby to Stay on Track for Jupiter’s Icy Moons

In order to stay on course for its final destination, Jupiter's icy moons, which it is scheduled to reach in July 2031, the European Space Agency's Jupiter Icy Moons Explorer, or JUICE, successfully completed a gravity-assist flyby of Venus on August 31, 2025. This maneuver was necessary to accelerate the probe without using additional fuel, but it also presented difficulties because of Venus's intense heat, which forced JUICE to deactivate its sensors and use its high-gain antenna as a thermal shield, which prevented any photography from being taken during the flyby.

Navigation

According to a statement from ESA, in order to progressively increase the velocity required to reach Jupiter by mid-2031, JUICE is utilizing a sequence of gravitational slingshots, beginning with Earth and Moon in 2024, Venus in 2025, and two additional Earth flybys in 2026 and 2029.

After roughly 20 hours of troubleshooting, engineers were able to restore contact after resolving a communication glitch caused by a timing error in the medium-gain antenna prior to the Venus encounter. The spacecraft was shielded by the antenna during the actual flyby, which took place at 1:28 a.m. EST (05:28 GMT).

Destination

JUICE's trajectory culminates in reaching the Jovian system in July 2031, where it will conduct extensive observations of Europa, Ganymede, and Callisto—three moons that are believed to harbor oceans under their icy crusts, meaning they could be solid leads in astronomers' quest to find life beyond Earth.

The mission will also mark the first time a spacecraft orbits a moon other than Earth's: Ganymede . As JUICE approaches its target, its suite of instruments, including the ice-penetrating radar RIME, will probe the moons' hidden oceans and geophysical properties .