Red Spots Meet

Author: Tom* Comments(5)

I didn’t get to see it for myself, thanks to the seemingly unending stretch of miserable weather, but, Jupiter’s red spots (The Great Red Spot and Oval BA.) did meet. The wonderful image below is courtesy the Gemini Observatory and was produced by Travis Rector of the University of Alaska Anchorage, Chad Trujillo of Gemini Observatory and the Gemini ALTAIR adaptive optics team. The Gemini has an excellent accompanying article to go with the image, you should check it out.

Personally I prefer the name Red Spot Junior to Oval BA, but they both mean the same thing

5 Comments so far

  1. dan cooper on July 23rd, 2006

    a very special moment. a real pleasure to see rare event! tks for the picture!!

  2. Dawn on July 24th, 2006

    Thanks Tom…great picture..awesome sight to see..

  3. David on July 24th, 2006

    So, will they stay in parallel rotation, one below the other, both traveling around Jupiter at the same time and speed? Will they ever merge? Collide?

    Thank you for sharing the information and for something to think about.

  4. john on July 25th, 2006

    wouldn’t the smaller storm move faster it has less to orbit around?

  5. Tom on July 25th, 2006

    John, that’s exactly what is going on too.. :)

    David, I believe I read they won’t merge, but that is how Red Jr formed in first place – three white spots merged and then became red. I want to know what the composition of the “red” is. Not telling how long it will last either.

Leave a reply