These Hubble Space Telescope snapshots reveal an impact scar on Jupiter fading from view over several months between July 2009 and November 2009.
The image of Jupiter’s full disk was taken July 23, 2009, revealing an elongated, dark spot at lower right (inside the rectangular box).
NASA/ESA
June 4, 2010
Without warning, a mystery object struck Jupiter on July 19, 2009, leaving a dark bruise the size of the Pacific Ocean. The spot first caught the eye of an amateur astronomer in Australia, and soon observatories around the world, including NASA’s Hubble Space Telescope, were zeroing in on the unexpected blemish.
Without warning, a mystery object struck Jupiter on July 19, 2009, leaving a dark bruise the size of the Pacific Ocean. The spot first caught the eye of an amateur astronomer in Australia, and soon observatories around the world, including NASA’s Hubble Space Telescope, were zeroing in on the unexpected blemish.
Astronomers had witnessed this kind of cosmic event before. Similar scars had been left behind during the course of a week in July 1994 when more than 20 pieces of Comet P/Shoemaker-Levy 9 (SL9) plunged into Jupiter’s atmosphere. The 2009 impact occurred during the same week, 15 years later.
Astronomers who compared Hubble images of both collisions say the culprit may have been an asteroid about 1,600 feet (500 meters) wide. The images, therefore, may show for the first time the immediate aftermath of an asteroid, rather than a comet, striking another planet.
