This series of pictures shows four views of the planet Venus obtained by Galileo's Solid State
Imaging System at ranges of 1.4 to 2 million miles as the spacecraft receded from Venus. The
pictures in the top row were taken about 4 and 5 days after closest approach; those in the bottom
row were taken about 6 days out, 2 hours apart. In these violet- light images, north is at the top
and the evening terminator to the left. The cloud features high in the planet's atmosphere rotate
from right to left, from the limb through the noon meridian toward the terminator, traveling all the
way around the planet once every four days. The motion can be seen by comparing the last two
pictures, taken two hours apart. The other views show entirely different faces of Venus. These
photographs are part of the 'Venus global circulation' sequence planned by the imaging team.
The Galileo Project is managed for NASA's Office of Space Science and Applications by the Jet
Propulsion Laboratory; its mission is to study Jupiter and its satellites and magnetosphere after
multiple gravity-assist flybys at Venus and Earth.
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