QUESTION:
Someone might suggest that you drop Venus and put Jupiter on his 
"Where is Cassini Now" page.  By the way - How close will Cassini 
come to Jupiter next year, and what are the estimated hazards from 
radiation and dust/debris in rings or the "cloud" around that planet?
 
ANSWER from Greg Chin on September 23, 1999:
Where is Cassini now?

As of today (9/22/99), Cassini is approximately 53,535,989 km Earth
relative range; the S/C is traveling approximately 73,383 km/hr.  Again,
all these values are "relative" as the S/C is moving away from the Earth
(yesterday's range was 51,784,412 km; rate was 72,583 km).

How close will Cassini come to Jupiter?

The Jupiter flyby will occur on December 30, 2000 at an altitude of 9.7
million km with a velocity relative to Jupiter of about 12 km/s. The
required Saturn arrival date is closely related to the Jupiter flyby
altitude. A closer flyby would increase the bending angle and the
heliocentric energy (reducing the SOI maneuver), but would cause
undesirable delays in the arrival date.... The Jupiter flyby can act as a
rehearsal for science planning as well as science observations which will
occur at Saturn.   At the time of the Jupiter flyby, the Galileo spacecraft
may still be operating (in its extended mission mode) in the Jovian system.
This may be an opportunity for some concurrent measurements from the two
missions.

Some additional "flyby" information for some Jupiter satellites....


			Distance   	Speed

				km    		km/s

FLYBY HIMALIA                                     2000 DEC 18, 22:46:00.57
		4,439,324.038   	10.233
FLYBY SINOPE                                      2001 JAN 7, 07:04:07.74
		7,010,431.447   	13.870
FLYBY CARME                                       2001 JAN 15, 16:35:12.22
		7,487,127.125   	12.381

Estimate hazards from radiation and dust/debris from the planet?

Given Cassini's distance, hazards from radiation and dust/debris should be
none.  At this point, Cassini will probably not pass through the
magnetopause, and may not even pass inside the bow shock, depending on
solar activity at the time.

Update the "Where is Cassini Now?" web site?

Good input...So, we should get this page updated in the not too 
distance future....

Just as a side note, you might want to check out the following site on the
Cassini Imaging Science Subsystem (ISS):

	http://ciclops.lpl.arizona.edu/