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Blobrana


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Oval BA - 'Diffusion' Caused Jupiter's Red Spot Junior To Colour Up
A study has given new insights into why Oval BA, a giant anticyclone on Jupiter also known as Red Spot Junior, suddenly turned from white to red in a period of just a few months.
The Oval BA is an enormous anticyclone (high-pressure system) that may be compared to a colossal hurricane in the Earths atmosphere. Oval BA is half the size of the Great Red Spot and is large enough to contain the Earth inside it.
Oval BA was formed in 2000 by the merger of smaller vortices called the White Ovals in a chain of collisions that started back in 1998. The apparent reddening was first reported by amateur astronomers in early 2006, but it was not until April that professional astronomers were able to image the impressive alteration of the second largest storm in the Solar System after the Great Red Spot (GRS).

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Blobrana


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Jupiters third giant red storm has been chewed up by a collision with the planets other two red spots and may not survive.
Jupiters spots are actually massive, hurricane-like storms. The Great Red Spot, which is three times the diameter of Earth, has been raging for at least 340 years. Red Spot Jr, also known as Oval BA, turned red in 2006.
The third spot first appeared around May 9 this year when a white storm turned scarlet.
According to a report in New Scientist, astronomers are still scrambling to capture pictures of the aftermath, but it appears Jupiters third spot was torn up last week when it squeezed between its larger cousins, the Great Red Spot and Red Spot Junior.

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Blobrana


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The two biggest storms in the solar system are about to go bump in the night, in plain view of backyard telescopes.

Storm #1 is the Great Red Spot, twice as wide as Earth itself, with winds blowing 350 mph. The behemoth has been spinning around Jupiter for hundreds of years.

Storm #2 is Oval BA, also known as "Red Jr.," a youngster of a storm only six years old. Compared to the Great Red Spot, Red Jr. is half-sized, able to swallow Earth merely once, but it blows just as hard as its older cousin.


The two are converging. Closest approach: the 4th of July, according to Amy Simon-Miller of the Goddard Space Flight Centre who has been monitoring the storms using the Hubble Space Telescope.

"There won't be a head-on collision. The Great Red Spot is not going to 'eat' Oval BA or anything like that" - Amy Simon-Miller.

But the storms' outer bands will pass quite close to one another—and no one knows exactly what will happen.

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