Harry’s “Comparative Astronomy” Pages

 

(Or: how much one can get out of drawing circles)

 

Jupiter’s Red Spot


The Red Spot on Jupiter’s atmosphere is a gigantic (by our earthly standards) storm system. It persists on the Jovian surface for more than three hundred years! (It has been present since it was first detected in the 17th century.) Earth’s disk is superimposed on Jupiter’s in the following figure, which gives an idea of the size of this cyclone.

I doubt anyone would enjoy living under such a cyclone for hundreds of years. Besides, it doesn’t rain water over there; it rains ammonia, and methane, and what-have-you, probably with a tad of sulfuric acid, for spice.


Back to the “Topics in Astronomy” index page.