What common misconception exists about the imagery captured during Galileo's final dive into Jupiter?
That Galileo sent back dramatic videos of its fiery demise.
A frequent misunderstanding among the public is that the Galileo probe returned spectacular visual footage or video evidence of its final moments crashing into Jupiter. In reality, the probe was not oriented for continuous, high-resolution imaging of the descent. Its instruments capable of optical observation, like the Solid-State Imager, were either deactivated or positioned away from the direction of travel. Furthermore, these optical instruments were not designed to withstand the extreme heat, pressure, and plasma encountered during entry; they would have been instantly blinded or destroyed long before the craft disintegrated. The value derived from the final moments was compositional data, not visual documentation.
