Great Red Spot "vs" Red. Jr. (Jupiter)

Palomar · 2006-07-08 04:43:50

{Ding! Ding!} In this corner, weighing in at twice the size of Earth and 300 years old -- The Great Red Spot. And in the other corner, weighing in at half the size of TGRS and only a few months old -- Red Junior

The long-awaited collision between Jupiter's Great Red Spot and Red Jr is underway. So far, both storms are holding their own:

Possibilities:

Closest approach "should happen late next week," says Philippine astronomer Christopher Go who has been tracking the storms's convergence. Although no one knows what will happen, researchers have offered some possibilities:
1. Storm bands may peel off, forming new turbulent curly-cues.
2. Red Jr might lose its red color, turning white.
3. Or the two storms could pass unscathed and unaltered.

--that from Spaceweather.com. Hmmmm...I'm hoping Red Jr. remains red and stays intact.

Palomar · 2006-07-20 04:32:35

RED vs RED JR:
Jupiter's Great Red Spot and Red Jr. are bumping into each other this week. So far, "the great storms are surviving just fine," reports Don Parker of Coral Gables, Florida, who took this picture on July 15th:

Parker took another image on the same night, an 890 nano-meter "methane band" image. Look, the two storms are very bright. This means they are jutting high above the surrounding cloudtops, a sign of cyclonic strength. Neither storm seems much weakened by the ongoing encounter.
Extra: How does the methane band work? Jupiter's atmosphere is rich in methane, CH4, a molecule which absorbs 890 nm light. To be bright in the methane band, a storm must avoid absorption by rising high above the bulk of the atmosphere.

From spaceweather.com

--Another Update:

Jupiter's Great Red Spot and Red Jr. are bumping into each other this week. So far, "the great storms are surviving just fine"..."Red Jr. is now right under the Great Red Spot..."

*From spaceweather.com of course. I hope Red Jr. survives so we can continue watching whatever further evolution it has...or just to have 2 big red spots on Jupiter; either way is fine with me.

--Cindy

Rxke · 2006-07-20 04:55:37

offtopic: re your sig...

Shuttlecrews consist of 5-7 people, only two are pilots, are the others then not astronauts in your view?

I mean, some of them even do EVA's, and you could argue a spacesuit is a mini-spacecraft.

BTW... Yuri Gagarin couldn't pilot his craft either... Or Glenn, even more so, he was just doing a suborbital jump, the trajectory was written in stone, yet he's commonly seen as the first American astronaut (rightfully so, IMO...)

Josh Cryer · 2006-07-21 21:14:11

LOL, your sig is awesome Rxke.

Palomar · 2006-07-25 06:21:27

False-color infrared image: Most recent w/ caption

*Beautiful photo regardless of false color infrared. IIRC, the bright white dot near upper center is one of the Galilean moons. I saw the photo and w/an article yesterday but cannot recall which web site; anyway, I thought I saw reference to one of the Galilean moons being in this photo.

Richard_a · 2008-03-07 12:47:07

False-color infrared image: Most recent w/ caption
*Beautiful photo regardless of false color infrared. IIRC, the bright white dot near upper center is one of the Galilean moons. I saw the photo and w/an article yesterday but cannot recall which web site; anyway, I thought I saw reference to one of the Galilean moons being in this photo.

it really is a nice photo - very high resolution, i'm not sure though the little white dot is one of the galilean moons, how can one be sure of this?
Ritchie from TheReefTank

cIclops · 2008-03-07 12:51:58

It's only 46 KB ... let's see it!

it really is a nice photo - very high resolution, i'm not sure though the little white dot is one of the galilean moons, how can one be sure of this?

By running a simulator. Starry Night shows Io was making a transit in that location 25 Jul 2006 about 18:00 UT.

cIclops · 2008-05-23 03:25:00

New Red Spot Appears on Jupiter - 22 may 2008

In what's beginning to look like a case of planetary measles, a third red spot has appeared alongside its cousins — the Great Red Spot and Red Spot Jr. — in the turbulent Jovian atmosphere.
This third red spot, which is a fraction of the size of the two other features, lies to the west of the Great Red Spot in the same latitude band of clouds.
The new red spot was previously a white oval-shaped storm. The change to a red color indicates its swirling storm clouds are rising to heights like the clouds of the Great Red Spot. One possible explanation is that the red storm is so powerful it dredges material from deep beneath Jupiter's cloud tops and lifts it to higher altitudes where solar ultraviolet radiation — via some unknown chemical reaction — produces the familiar brick color.
Detailed analysis of the visible-light images taken by Hubble's Wide Field Planetary Camera 2 on May 9 and 10, and near-infrared adaptive optics images taken by the W.M. Keck telescope on May 11, is revealing the relative altitudes of the cloud tops of the three red ovals. Because all three oval storms are bright in near-infrared light, they must be towering above the methane in Jupiter's atmosphere, which absorbs the Sun's infrared light and so looks dark in infrared images.

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#1 2006-07-08 04:43:50

Re: Great Red Spot "vs" Red. Jr. (Jupiter)

#2 2006-07-20 04:32:35

Re: Great Red Spot "vs" Red. Jr. (Jupiter)

#3 2006-07-20 04:55:37

Re: Great Red Spot "vs" Red. Jr. (Jupiter)

#4 2006-07-21 21:14:11

Re: Great Red Spot "vs" Red. Jr. (Jupiter)

#5 2006-07-25 06:21:27

Re: Great Red Spot "vs" Red. Jr. (Jupiter)

#6 2008-03-07 12:47:07

Re: Great Red Spot "vs" Red. Jr. (Jupiter)

#7 2008-03-07 12:51:58

Re: Great Red Spot "vs" Red. Jr. (Jupiter)

#8 2008-05-23 03:25:00

Re: Great Red Spot "vs" Red. Jr. (Jupiter)

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