NASA's space probe Juno released new photos of Jupiter's iconic Great Red Spot.
Juno's pass around the planet on Monday was the closest we've ever been to the red spot.
The spot is a massive storm system about twice the size of Earth. For reference, Jupiter is 320 times the size of our beautiful planet.
“The feature is actually a giant storm larger than Earth that has been blowing in the planet’s atmosphere for hundreds of years,” said Fran Bagenal, a Juno mission co-investigator. “The orbiting spacecraft will skim several thousand miles over the Great Red Spot, using instruments that let scientists peer beneath the cloud tops.”
NASA has sent seven probes to take pictures and study Jupiter, but Juno is the closest.
Juno launched on July 4, 2016 and has been flying through the solar system since then.
Researchers at the University of Colorado at Boulder say the probe will provide information about the little intricacies of the storm. Is it dense like a tornado? Or are those massive bunches of clouds a bit thinner?
Researchers at CU Boulder have a ton of questions going into this flyover.
