Mike's Astro Photos

Jupiter With Moons

Amateur astronomer Anthony Wesley of Murrumbateman, Australia noticed a new peculiar Earth sized mark on the face of Jupiter two days ago. It is believed the mark could have been caused by a comet colliding with the planet. NASA confirmed this report using an infrared telescope in Hawaii. A weird coincidence about this observation is it happened on the same day as the Shoemaker-Levy 9 comet collision in 1994. That comet bombarded Jupiter over a 6 day period (July 16th-July 22). That is the same exact time period of this most recent crash. Along with the 40th aniversary of the moon landing, this is definately wierd timing. There are currently no reports of anyone or thing witnessing the recent collision so scientists don’t know exactly what it was, but it is believed to have been a comet. In honor of Anthony’s discovery I thought I would post a picture I recently took of Jupiter. I’m still working on my planetary imaging skills, so this picture is pretty bad. Even though you can’t see any detail on Jupiter (due to the shot being over exposed), you can see 4 of Jupiter’s moons and their alignment looks pretty cool. Way to go Anthony you’re the man! Check out Anthony’s site and pictures of Jupiter here.