Exploration of Jupiter Exploration of Jupiter The exploration of Jupiter has been conducted via close observations by automated spacecraft. It began with the arrival of "Pioneer 10" into the Jovian system in 1973, and, , has continued with eight further spacecraft missions. All of these missions were undertaken by the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA), and all but two have been flybys that take detailed observations without the probe landing or entering orbit. These probes make Jupiter the most visited of the Solar System's outer planets as all missions to the outer Solar System have used Jupiter flybys to reduce fuel requirements
STS-61-F STS-61-F STS-61-F was a United States Space Shuttle mission planned to launch on 15 May 1986 using "Challenger". It was cancelled after "Challenger" was destroyed earlier that year. The main objective of STS-61-F was to deploy the "Ulysses" solar probe, which would travel to Jupiter and use it as a gravitational slingshot in order to be placed into polar orbit around the Sun. This mission would have marked the first use of the Centaur-G liquid-fueled payload booster, which would also be used on the subsequent mission to send the Galileo probe in orbit around Jupiter. Due to the use of