Pop-up clouds on Jupiter
Click for full image.
Cool image time! The photo above was cropped and enhanced by citizen scientist Gerald Eichstädt from a raw Juno image taken during that spacecraft’s 37th orbit. I have reduced it slightly to post here.
The photo shows what he calls “pop-up” clouds floating above a much larger cloud eddy. Unfortunately, Eichstädt provides no scale, but I suspect this image would easily cover the Earth, with those white clouds probably far larger than the biggest hurricane on Earth.
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Click for full image.
Cool image time! The photo above was cropped and enhanced by citizen scientist Gerald Eichstädt from a raw Juno image taken during that spacecraft’s 37th orbit. I have reduced it slightly to post here.
The photo shows what he calls “pop-up” clouds floating above a much larger cloud eddy. Unfortunately, Eichstädt provides no scale, but I suspect this image would easily cover the Earth, with those white clouds probably far larger than the biggest hurricane on Earth.
Readers!
Please consider supporting my work here at Behind the Black. Your support allows me the freedom and ability to analyze objectively the ongoing renaissance in space, as well as the cultural changes -- for good or ill -- that are happening across America. Fourteen years ago I wrote that SLS and Orion were a bad ideas, a waste of money, would be years behind schedule, and better replaced by commercial private enterprise. Only now does it appear that Washington might finally recognize this reality.
In 2020 when the world panicked over COVID I wrote that the panic was unnecessary, that the virus was apparently simply a variation of the flu, that masks were not simply pointless but if worn incorrectly were a health threat, that the lockdowns were a disaster and did nothing to stop the spread of COVID. Only in the past year have some of our so-called experts in the health field have begun to recognize these facts.
Your help allows me to do this kind of intelligent analysis. I take no advertising or sponsors, so my reporting isn't influenced by donations by established space or drug companies. Instead, I rely entirely on donations and subscriptions from my readers, which gives me the freedom to write what I think, unencumbered by outside influences.
You can support me either by giving a one-time contribution or a regular subscription. There are four ways of doing so:
1. Zelle: This is the only internet method that charges no fees. All you have to do is use the Zelle link at your internet bank and give my name and email address (zimmerman at nasw dot org). What you donate is what I get.
2. Patreon: Go to my website there and pick one of five monthly subscription amounts, or by making a one-time donation.
3. A Paypal Donation or subscription:
4. Donate by check, payable to Robert Zimmerman and mailed to
Behind The Black
c/o Robert Zimmerman
P.O.Box 1262
Cortaro, AZ 85652
You can also support me by buying one of my books, as noted in the boxes interspersed throughout the webpage or shown in the menu above.
Hi Robert,
Thanks for choosing this PJ37 image!
Here a statement which is neither peer-reviewed nor cross-checked. So, consider it my preliminary and unofficial opinion:
I would estimate the horizontal extent of the image to cover about 4,000 km. I retrieved the estimate from a north polar azimuthal map I’ve rendered in the meanwhile. Don’t nail me down to the exact value. The view is somewhat oblique. So the vertical and the horizontal scale aren’t quite the same.
We don’t know yet the accurate true nature of those cumulus-like “pop-up” clouds. Therefore that informal name. But I’m pretty sure that they are a result of local upwelling. Earth-analogs could be any cumulus-type cloud ranging from cirrocumulus to hailstorms. This remains subject to further investigation. Interestingly, in this case, they are on-top of those huge and very turbulent storm systems.
According to the metadata of the image (PJ37 image #034), it was taken from an altitude of 3,288.4 km above Jupiter’s cloud tops, or let’s better say above its IAU 1-bar level. The nominal subspacecraft position was 27.1129°N, 47.1482°E, planetocentric L3. Due to the high velocity of the spacecraft near perijove, the framelets the image is recontructed from are actually taken from different points along Juno’s trajectory.
Despite the image being cropped to a horizontal field of view of about 39°, the oblique pointing towards Jupiter ends up with covering roughly 4,000 km. The nearby horizon in the full image is located left of the cropped area. So, the left side of the image is more condensed than the right one.
Gerald: Thank you for the comment. If you search my website for your name you will see that I have featured quite a number of your Juno enhanced shots.
Now that I have your email address, I will email you next time I want to post one.
Thank you, Robert, for helping to promote the Juno project!
From time to time, I search the web for my name, and happen to find your web site.
Often enough, there is only few time to find out additional information about an image and to prepare a detailed caption for the images I post. But sometimes, I may be able to provide information beyond the caption on the missionjuno website.
There will likely be times I’m too busy to check my emails.
In that case or if my response via email takes too long, just post your article the way you used to in the past.