Science and Exploration

Jupiter Jet and Brown Barge

By Keith Cowing
Press Release
March 11, 2019
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Jupiter Jet and Brown Barge
Jupiter
NASA/JPL-Caltech/SwRI/MSSS/Gerald Eichstadt/Justin Cowart

The southern edge of Jupiter’s north polar region is captured in this view from NASA’s Juno spacecraft.
The scene prominently displays a long, brown oval known as a “brown barge” located within a polar jet stream, called “Jet N4.”

This image was taken at 9:25 a.m. PST on Feb. 12, 2019 (12:25 p.m. EST), as the spacecraft performed its 18th close flyby of Jupiter. At the time, Juno was about 5,000 miles (8,000 kilometers) from the planet’s cloud tops, above a latitude of approximately 44 degrees north.

Citizen scientists Gerald Eichstädt and Justin Cowart created this view using data from the spacecraft’s JunoCam imager. The scene has been rotated approximately 90 degrees to the right.

JunoCam’s raw images are available at www.missionjuno.swri.edu/junocam for the public to peruse and process into image products.

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SpaceRef co-founder, Explorers Club Fellow, ex-NASA, Away Teams, Journalist, Space & Astrobiology, Lapsed climber.