Simulation of the Juno Spacecraft flyby today !

[APODman]

Launched in 2011, and after a complete orbit around the Sun, in a few hours the Juno spacecraft will approach Earth at a mere 500km altitude to perform a "gravitational slingshot" maneuver to gain impulse for the final journey to the planet Jupiter in which it will enter into polar orbit.

I performed a simulation in US of the final moments of the spacecraft approaching, apparently the program does successfully simulate its "orbital bend". I not tested yet but I'm curious to know if it will reach Jupiter.




The flyby of Juno can be followed live online in 2 hours and 49 minutes, the passage will have narration Brian Cox. A must see event !


- http://events.slooh.com/stadium/juno-flies-earth


More information about Juno flyby in:
- http://www.space.com/23120-jupiter-juno-spacecraft-earth-flyby-explained.html
- http://www.universetoday.com/105228/juno-careening-to-earth-for-critical-flyby-boost-and-cool-movie-making-on-oct-9-watch-slooh-live/


(Planetary and Spacecraft data of simulation from JPL Horizons)


Regards !

[APODman]

Fantastic ! Running the simulation for a little over 2.7 years Juno Spacecraft reaches Jupiter at exactly angle to an insert in a polar orbit, exactly as planned and presented by NASA simulations.

Obviously it was not possible to capture Juno in orbit of Jupiter since this process will involve a series of maneuvers guided from Earth (which could even be partially simulated but do not know the exact values ​​of timing and velocity change needed)

But once again the Universe Sandbox proved surprisingly accurate, congratulations Dan Dixon, that version 3.0 maintains this level of quality and precision!






The simulation file of the final approach of Juno with Jupiter are attached in this post.

To compare:
http://missionjuno.swri.edu/orbit?quality=low&show=hs_orbit_story_polar-orbit


Regards !