Space Update - New Red Spot for Jupiter

If you know anything about the Solar System, you are familiar with Jupiter's Great Red Spot, a storm twice as wide as our planet and at least 300 years old. The Great Red Spot is the most powerful storm in the whole solar system.

Well, Jupiter is growing a new red spot. The official name of the new storm is "Oval BA". It's about half the size of the famous Great Red Spot and almost exactly the same color.














Oval BA first appeared in the year 2000 when three smaller spots collided and merged.

Oval BA has been changing colors in recent months.

It was white in November 2005, slowly turned brown in December and then red a few weeks ago. Scientists are wondering if Oval BA has become permanently red.

Other Space Related news:

Scientists have discovered a huge crater in the Saharan desert, about 19 miles (31 kilometers) wide. The newfound crater was likely carved by a space rock that was itself roughly 0.75 miles wide in an event that would have been quite a shock, destroying everything for hundreds of miles. The crater is named “Kebira,” which means “large” in Arabic.

Scientists are debating whether or not there may be water on the moon, in permanently shadowed craters at the lunar poles, called "cold traps". If there is enough lunar water at the bottom of deep craters it might be converted to oxygen, drinkable water, even rocket fuel for future Lunar missions. If the US finds the water first we will, of course, appropriate it in violation of The Moon Treaty(link).