Meteorologists mostly study weather on the Earth, but there are planetary scientists who also study the atmosphere on other planets. In the past, this blog has posted pictures of a dust devil and cirrus clouds on Mars. Earlier this week, on June 15, 2023, NASA released this stunning image of a lightning bolt in Jupiter’s atmosphere. NASA’s Juno spacecraft captured the electrifying shot back on December 30, 2020, during its 31st close flyby of the king of planets. Lightning is formed when charge differences occur between low and high levels in the atmosphere. In the earth’s atmosphere, these charge differences are built up due to impacts of ice crystals that form in tall cumulonimbus clouds. Jupiter also has a thick atmosphere, allowing charge differences to build up. But it took a scientist quite a bit of post-processing of an image of Jupiter to identify a flash from lightning, resulting in the image below. You can read more at EarthSky here.
