Jupiter: Now Less Stripey

Yeah, just geeking out…

For reasons astronomers can’t currently explain completely, Jupiter has lost an entire ginormous and very visible stripe from its surface, altering the face of the solar system’s largest planet.

The entire SEB (South Equatorial Belt), which is twice as wide as the Earth and twenty times as long, just vanished, 2001: A Space Odyssey style. I love all the mysteries about Jupiter and how little we actually seem to know. Like, why the Big Red Spot is red or has been a sustained, raging Earth-sized atmospheric storm for so incredibly long.