Jupiter
in 2000/2001
Jupiter
during the Cassini encounter
John
Rogers, Hans-Joerg Mettig, Damian Peach, & Michael Foulkes
Abstract:
The main changes on Jupiter in
2000 were the disappearance of the dark band and festoons in the Equatorial
Zone, and the broadening of the North Equatorial Belt (NEB) into the North
Tropical Zone. While dark projections on southern NEB diminished in number,
irregular projections from northern NEB eventually constituted a classical
expansion event which was complete by the start of 2001, and the expanded belt
was pockmarked with dark 'barges' and white ovals.
Most of the major spots had
persisted from the previous apparition, especially anticyclonic ovals, and their
drifts, circulations, and appearances were largely unchanged. These included not
only the Great Red Spot and a brown ring in the S. Tropical domain, but also
anticyclonic white ovals in almost every other domain. Some of these, in
latitudes ranging from the South Polar region to the N.N. Temperate region,
apparently persisted between apparitions in spite of showing large and sudden
changes in their drift rates.
Outbreaks of dark spots were
continuing in the SEBs, NTBs, and NNTBs jetstreams.
In addition, we detected several spots moving in the SSTBn jetstream,
which has rarely been detected from Earth, and one each in the NTBn, NNTBn, and
N5TBs jetstreams, which have never previously been detected from
Earth.
The highlight of the apparition
was the Cassini spacecraft flyby. Cassini
images revealed details of all the spots and circulations that we recorded;
examples are presented in an Appendix. Observations
at non-visible wavelengths, from amateur and professional observers and from
Cassini, will be presented in Parts II and III of this report.
_____________________________________________________________________________
Introduction
General
description
Local
features and drifts
Appendix:
A Cassini atlas of Jupiter
In this Appendix we show examples
of the Cassini imagery to give detailed views of the atmospheric features that
we have tracked....
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