Two massive cyclones to converge on Jupiter

The famous big red spot seen on Jupiter is about to come in close contact with a smaller swirling storm, named Oval-BA.

The big red spot is a cyclonic storm that has been raging for centuries, it's also twice the size of earth, with the upcoming convergence with it's smaller counterpart, which incidentally is still larger than earth, scientists aren't sure what could happen.

This isn't the first time the two have come together and in fact, Oval-BA was created from a storm impact in 1997-2000:



Despite all this, what exactly will happen still remains a mystery.

Here they are photographed by Efrain Morales Rivera in Puerto Rico:



Some further reading:

science.nasa.gov...
www.spaceweather.com...
science.nasa.gov...

Very cool science stuff to make my mind off nasy English Chavs ... do you know when the collision will occur? Have not read your links yet.

reply to post by deltaalphanovember


They're probably passing by each other as we speak.

Hopefully we'll get to see some action.

Here's a snippet from the previous convergence:

Similar encounters have happened before, notes JPL's Glenn Or ton, a colleague of Simon-Miller. "Oval BA and the Great Red Spot pass each other approximately every two years." Previous encounters in 2002 and 2004 were anti-climatic. Aside from some "roughing" around the edges, both storms survived apparently unaltered. This time might be different. Simon-Miller and Orton think Red Jr. could lose its red color, ironically, by passing too close to the Great Red Spot.

Could get interesting!

I haven't heard about the previous convergence so this is new to me and fascinating. It's always amazing to be reminded of the size and duration of the red spot storm.

they are quite close, right now.

Last night we had the 20 inch mak/cass on it,
and tonight will be doing the same.

also will have the 14inch pointed at it.

If any decent photos are taken I will share them.

Cool, thanks for the info, this will be interesting to follow. I have always been interested in Jupiter, which is my favorite planet because of the storm. I guess since I have always been interested in weather, hurricanes, etc. It just comes natural. I found a few cool pics online that I thought I would share below. (Note - Photos not related to current event)









From - www.sciencefacts.us...

The Great Red Spot is a giant storm on Jupiter’s surface. It is similar to a hurricane but much larger in size. In fact, three earths could fit in the size of the Great Red Spot. Jupiter’s Great Red Spot was first discovered in the 1600’s by astronomer Robert Hooke. The longevity of this storm is at least partially due to the fact that storm never goes over land. Similar to when hurricanes reach land, they lose steam, but the Great Red Spot never encounters land because Jupiter’s surface does not have any.

I'm interested to see how this plays out.

To be a stickler, isn't it an anti-cyclonic storm, thought i heard that on the History Channel program the other day. (some 7 wonders of the solar system or whatever featuring the great red spot.)


Anyway this should be pretty cool, i was hoping i could see a little animation of possible outcome on the collision but couldn't find one with a quick 2 second search. Maybe once this thing goes down there will be one.

a piece of Jupiter will come out and it will head directly to earth

then this what will happen on ATS: hundreds of threads on ATS saying webot predicted will appear, plus some members claiming they predicted, besides the "it was written on the ~insert your book here~" too, and we cannot forget the "Mayans 2012 relation"

someone had to say it, since this is a "mystery"

Can you even imagine how colossal those storms truly are? I certainly can't. 2 storms bigger than the Earth colliding is an event beyond epic.

Looking forward to see what happens.

reply to post by Slih_09

ep·ic: of unusually great size or extent

While it's size it absolutely impressive I question if it's truly epic. That's really only our perception of it since it's large in comparison to what we're familiar with. I'm now curious the ratio of the storm size compared to the planet size compared to storms on planet earth. Anyone know the answer to this?