BENEATH EUROPA'S ICE
Through a shell of ice, toward water we have never seen.
THE SURFACE
You arrive above water ice cut by fractures, ridges and disrupted terrain. Radiation from Jupiter alters materials at the surface; this is not an untouched window into the ocean below.
THROUGH THE ICE
The shell is not known to have one uniform thickness. Earlier estimates commonly span about 15 to 25 kilometres, while Juno measured an average near 29 kilometres only across the region it observed.
DARK WATER
Multiple lines of evidence point to a salty ocean beneath the shell. NASA commonly estimates it may be 60 to 150 kilometres deep and hold about twice the water in Earth's global ocean, but no probe has entered it.
THE UNSEEN BOUNDARY
Whether ocean water interacts directly with a rocky seafloor, and what chemistry occurs there, remain uncertain. Europa Clipper will constrain the moon's structure and habitability; it is not designed to find life directly.