Photo by Voyager 1 Jupiter's satellite Io poses returned Jan 17, 1979 47 million kilometers.

Photo by Voyager 1 Jupiter's satellite Io poses before the giant planet in this photo returned Jan 17, 1979 from a distance of 29 million miles (47 million kilometers). The satellite's shadow can be seen falling on the face of Jupiter at left. Io is traveling from left to right in its one-and-three-quarter-day orbit around Jupiter. Even from this great distance the image of Io shows dark poles and bright equatorial region. Voyager 1 will make its closest approach to Jupiter 174, 000 miles (280,000 kilometer) on March 5. It will then continue to Saturn in November 1980. This color photo was assembled at Jet Propulsion Laboratory's Image Processing Lab from three black and white images taken through filters. The Voyagers are managed for NASA's Office of Space Science by Jet Propulsion Laboratory. (JPL Ref: P-20946C)