By Chris Skeldon 
the North American Space Agency (NASA) On Monday it sent the Clipper probe that will study Europa, a moon of Jupiter that will have an ocean beneath its icy surface with conditions likely to harbor life as we know it.
The space probe launched from NASA's base in Florida at 12:06 local time (17:06 Lisbon time), aboard a Falcon Heavy rocket belonging to SpaceX, owned by businessman Elon Musk.
The Europa Clipper mission is NASA's first mission dedicated to “studying an ocean world beyond Earth.”
The probe will travel a distance of 2.9 billion kilometers, and after it begins orbiting Jupiter, the largest planet in the solar system, in April 2030, it will pass near Europe 49 times.
Europa, the smallest of Jupiter's four moons discovered by Galileo Galilei in the 17th century, is about the size of the Moon, Earth's natural satellite, but its interior is different.
Data collected by the Galileo space probe in the 1990s, according to NASA, revealed strong evidence that “underneath Europa’s ice lies an enormous salt ocean, containing more water than all of Earth’s oceans combined.”
Moreover, according to scientists, this moon of Jupiter could host organic compounds and energy sources beneath its surface.
The Clipper probe is equipped with nine scientific instruments, including “ice-penetrating radar, cameras, and a thermal device to search for warmer ice areas and any recent water eruptions.”
To keep these instruments powered in the weak sunlight reaching Jupiter, the probe carries the largest solar panels NASA has ever used on an interplanetary mission.
The probe is 30.5 meters long with the panels open.
Clipper is expected to begin conducting scientific flybys around Europa in 2031 to “determine the thickness of the moon’s ice sheet and its interactions with the ocean beneath it, investigate its composition and characterize its geology.”