History in the making: NASA’s Juno spacecraft arrives at Jupiter!

The biggest space event of the year is happening soon. On July 4, NASA’s un-crewed Juno spacecraft will end its nearly five-year journey through space and embark on a mission to study the planet Jupiter like never before.


But first, the spacecraft must lock on to Jupiter into what’s called a polar orbit. This is the most dangerous part of the entire Juno mission, and is what NASA will be watching instead of fireworks this holiday weekend.

As Juno approaches its destination on July 4, Jupiter’s tremendous gravitational pull will accelerate the spacecraft to blazing speeds of more than 150,000 mph (241,000 km/h), making Juno one of the fastest human-made objects ever built.

After reaching a max speed of 165,000 mph (266,000 km/h) – fast enough to fly around Earth in 9 minutes – Juno will slam on the breaks by firing its engines. This is where things get tricky.