Launched in 1989, the Galileo spacecraft arrived at Jupiter on
December 7, 1995, when it fired its main engine for
a successful orbit capture around Jupiter. On that day, Galileo's
atmospheric probe plunged into Jupiter's atmosphere and relayed information on
the structure and composition of the solar system's largest planet.
The spacecraft's orbiter will spend the next two years orbiting
the giant planet, studying Jupiter and its moons (encountering one
moon during each orbit), and returning a steady stream of
images and scientific data. The first two encounters were successfully
performed with Jupiter's largest moon, Ganymede, on June 27, 1996
and September 6, 1996. There is a mirror site
at: http://galileo.ivv.nasa.gov/