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Comment by gambiting | Hacker News Reader

The problem that most people aren't even aware of is that Jupiter(and maybe others? I'm actually not sure) is throwing a massive amount of radiation around - getting anywhere close to it would kill any human very quickly. It's a huge factor in any proposed missions to its moons - like, it would be awesome to explore Europa, the concept is fascinating, but its surface is deadly due to radiation coming from Jupiter.

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Yeah, the radiation was partly why I wrote "capable of sending people". You'd probably need quite a few metres of water ice surrounding your livable space if you don't want to get fried.

Which makes me wonder: if a ship was covered in, say, 10 metres of ice, would the top layer get irradiated and thus need to be replaced every so often? I wonder if it was left exposed to space, would the water ice sublimate away? Then "all" you'd need to do is replace the top layer.

Humans safe behind ice while robots do the work isn't quite as romantic as The Expanse but it'll get the job done!

What is even the benefit of being physically located right next to Jupiter, if you have to stay enclosed in 10 meters of ice at all times? Sure, you have an hour lag or so to communicate from Earth, but that seems easier to solve than all the problems of shipping humans around.

On the other hand, Europa has its thick ice surface shielding a lot of that radiation, making for an absolutely fascinating place to visit.

given that the moons are tidally locked, is it going to be safer on the far sides?

Sure! It still leaves the issue of getting there, and you can't stay in the shadow of a moon the whole way there.

The radiation doesn't come from Jupiter but from its magnetosphere. The radiation comes from belts, like Earth's Van Allen belts, but much stronger. The Galilean moons are all inside the magnetosphere and Io is in the middle of the strongest belt.

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