Photo from open sources
A giant hurricane on the surface of Saturn, like a rosebud, photographed the NASA Cassini space probe. Magnitude of the storm impressive: its diameter is 2 thousand km, which is 20 times larger, than the biggest hurricane on earth.
Cassini for the first time allowed researchers to make out a hurricane on Saturn in detail. Wind speed in the center of a hurricane like it turned out reaches 150 m / second. Unlike earthly storms, that move around the planet, the hurricane on Saturn is stationary and located at its north pole. On Earth, hurricanes are usually drift north due to wind turbulence caused by movement the planet.
However, in many ways the storm on Saturn is similar to the earth, scientists say. This hurricane also has an “eye” – the center a vortex in which there are no clouds, like other signs of the earth the storm.
“We were surprised when we looked at the whirlwind, as it looked just like a hurricane on Earth, “said Andrew Ingersoll of California Institute of Technology. “But on Saturn everything is in much larger scale, with the amount of water vapor in Saturn’s atmosphere is much smaller, ”the scientist added.
Recall, Cassini recently helped researchers figure out what Saturn’s rings and moons are much older than previously thought. Space probe data indicate that they are about 4 billion years.
This means a kind of revolving around the gas giant “antique shop” – ancient celestial bodies that appeared yet at the time of the origin of the solar system, while around a young star there was a protoplanetary cloud.
To come to such a decision, astronomers were allowed to Cassini data on that there is a large amount of water ice around Saturn. So how Saturn is outside the “snow line” where the water is no longer evaporates under the influence of solar radiation, then astronomers concluded that this is an ancient ice that appeared in times of the origin of the solar system. He could not be brought there comets, because there are too many of them.
Cassini also recently collected new satellite and ring data. Saturn, which allow us to explain why they are painted in one or different color. For example, powerful geysers on Enceladus color this satellite and nearby rings in white. Other rings and satellites have a reddish tint, which they owe, apparently meteorites that brought there a large amount of iron oxide, writes The Daily Mail.
Victor Pospelov
Saturn Solar System
