On November 5, the Galileo spacecraft, which arrived in the Jupiter system seven years ago, went silent after enduring more than 4 times the radiation it was designed to withstand during its descent deep into the radiation belts that surround Jupiter. Now, CNN reports, Galileo has miraculously awoken and seems to be in good working order, except for its tape recorder. The probe is designed to shut down automatically, going in to “safe mode” when experiencing high radiation levels, so as to protect its sensitive electronics. The probe’s repeated exposures to radiation over the years have taken their toll on the spacecraft–its camera is shuttered and its tape player has become stuck several times. NASA engineers have always been able to fix the tape player before, but this time the problem is different. If they succeed, NASA will be able to download the data from the November 5 dive, which brought it within 160 kilometers of the moon Amalthea and inside Jupiter’s “gossamer” ring of diffuse debris outside the main ring. Galileo’s fuel is nearly empty and will be crashed into Jupiter in September 2003, to ensure that it does not accidentally hit Europa and contaminate any microbial life that may be present in its theorized subsurace ocean.