'King Of Storms' In Our Solar System Can Destroy Three Earth-Sized Planets
The Great Red Spot on Jupiter is an eternal storm characterised by consistent high pressure. The storm is considered the largest one in our solar system and spawns winds that run as fast as 432 kilometres per hour. Very recently, storm speeds have picked up, touching over 640 kilometres per hour.
The storm measured 16,350 kilometres on April 3, 2017. In fact, the Great Red Spot on Jupiter is 1.3 times the diameter of Earth! That's not all - The storm is ferocious enough to swallow three Earth-like planets.
What is the Great Red Spot?
The Great Red Spot has been causing a storm for over hundreds of years now, and the Hubble Space Telescope has brought the storm back in focus. With the telescope recording winds roughly 200 kilometres faster than normal, Jupiter is undergoing processes that we may not completely understand yet.
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Jupiter is a giant ball of gas, with no surface to offer. The largest planet in our solar system is also merciless. Made up of volatile liquids and gases, the planet would melt, crush and vaporise any human or spacecraft that attempted to fly into the planet.
Very similar to volcanic lava on Earth, the Great Red Spot is essentially Jupiter trying to spew out its gases that have concentrated at one spot. In images and artist outtakes, the Great Red Spot appears like a cake with layers depicting different shades of rusty brown with a tinge of red.
The king of solar system storms
Considered the king of storms in our solar system, the Great Red Spot which spans across 16,000 kilometres is picking up speed.
Hubble, the soon-to-be-retired telescope picked up the speedier winds in one of its "storm reports". In fact, between 2009 and 2020, the speeds of wind at the boundary of the storm has picked by up 8 per cent. But at the core of the storm, things are rather slow.?
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That may be difficult to see with Hubble owing to its inability to look at the bottom of the storm. With the upcoming James Webb Telescope set to revolutionise space exploration, we may be able to find out more about this oddball called Jupiter sooner than you think.
What astronomers are fascinated by is the ability of the Great Red Spot to not only maintain energy for hundreds of years, but even picking up pace in the recent years. What concerns scientists is the fuel that is igniting this particular storm.??
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