The Storm That Has Raged for Centuries!
Jupiter’s Great Red Spot is a storm of giant proportions
We are all familiar with the power of hurricanes. Most of them form near the equator and a few blow towards the continental landmasses. The hurricanes on earth, while powerful, do not last that long. The largest hurricane on Earth spanned 1000 miles with wind gusts topping at 200 mph. The longest one so far has been Hurricane John in 1994 that lasted for 31 days. Now imagine, a storm so huge that it can contain the entire earth, raging with wind speeds close to 400 mph and lasting not for months or years but centuries. It may sound incredible, but the Great Red Spot on the planet Jupiter is just that — an extreme storm raging on for 300 years now by one count!
The Great Red Spot is the largest anticyclonic storm in the solar system. It is located in an area of high pressure on Jupiter, 22 degrees south of the equator. The spot rotates counterclockwise, completing one rotation in 6 earth days (or 14 Jovian days). The storm was 1.3 times the diameter of the earth in April 2017. It is bounded by eastward-moving jet streams to its north and westward-moving jet streams to the south. The swirling boundaries formed and sustain the storm.
