Jupiter Gets Smacked Yet Again?

By Nancy Atkinson - August 22, 2010 02:41 PM UTC | Planetary Science

It looks like once again, Jupiter has taken a hit! And once again an amateur astronomer spotted and captured the event. Masayuki Tachikawa was observing Jupiter on at 18:22 Universal Time on August 20th (early on August 21 in Japan) and his video camera captured a 1-second-long flash on the planet's disk, along the northern edge of the gas giant's North Equatorial Belt. The event was reported by astronomer Junichi Watanabe from the National Astronomical Observatory of Japan, on his blog.

Tachikawa lives in Kumamato on the island of Kyushu and was observing with a Philips ToUcam Pro II attached to his 6-inch (150-mm) Takahashi TAO-150 f/7.3 refractor with a Tele Vue 5× Powermate. So, far no one else has reported seeing the event, and the amateur astronomers who captured earlier Jupiter impacts -- Anthony Wesley and Chris Go -- were not watching Jupiter at the time.

Coincidentally,

Tammy just posted some tips for observing Jupiter

, and with the low cost imagers that are now available, anyone can make discoveries -- so go out there are take a look!

Find out more about the impact at the

Gish Bar Times

,

Planetary Blog,

Sky and Telescope and

Sky Week (in German)

Nancy Atkinson

Nancy Atkinson

Nancy Atkinson is a space journalist and author with a passion for telling the stories of people involved in space exploration and astronomy. She is currently retired from daily writing, but worked at Universe Today for 20 years as a writer and editor. She also contributed articles to The Planetary Society, Ad Astra (National Space Society), New Scientist and many other online outlets.

Her 2019 book, "Eight Years to the Moon: The History of the Apollo Missions,” shares the untold stories of engineers and scientists who worked behind the scenes to make the Apollo program so successful, despite the daunting odds against it. Her first book “Incredible Stories From Space: A Behind-the-Scenes Look at the Missions Changing Our View of the Cosmos” (2016) tells the stories of 37 scientists and engineers that work on several current NASA robotic missions to explore the solar system and beyond.

Nancy is also a NASA/JPL Solar System Ambassador, and through this program, she has the opportunity to share her passion of space and astronomy with children and adults through presentations and programs. Nancy's personal website is nancyatkinson.com