NASA's Juno measures thickness of Europa's ice shell

Data from NASA's Juno mission has provided new insights into the thickness and subsurface structure of the icy shell encasing Jupiter's moon Europa. Using the spacecraft's Microwave Radiometer (MWR), mission scientists determined that the shell averages about 18 miles (29 kilometers) thick in the region observed during Juno's 2022 flyby of Europa. The Juno measurement is the first to discriminate between thin and thick shell models that have suggested the ice shell is anywhere from less than half a mile to tens of miles thick.