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A planet of Jupiter's mass still seems to provide increased protection against asteroids, but the total effect on all orbital bodies within the Solar System is unclear. This and other recent models call into question the nature of Jupiter's influence on Earth impacts. [52] [53] [54]
Jupiter is often able to capture comets that orbit the Sun; such comets enter unstable orbits around the planet that are highly elliptical and perturbable by solar gravity. While some of them eventually recover a heliocentric orbit, others crash into the planet or more rarely become one of its satellites. [2] [3]
The crash landing sites themselves are of interest to space archeology. Luna 1 , not itself a lunar orbiter, was the first spacecraft designed as an impactor . It failed to hit the Moon in 1959, however, thus inadvertently becoming the first man-made object to leave geocentric orbit and enter a heliocentric orbit , where it remains.
Artist's depiction of a collision between two planetary bodies. Such an impact between the Earth and a Mars-sized object likely formed the Moon. In the early history of the Earth (about four billion years ago), bolide impacts were almost certainly common since the Solar System contained far more discrete bodies than at present.
The Nibiru cataclysm is a supposed disastrous encounter between Earth and a large planetary object (either a collision or a near-miss) that certain groups believed would take place in the early 21st century.
The 2009 Jupiter impact event, occasionally referred to as the Wesley impact, was a July 2009 impact event on Jupiter that caused a black spot in the planet's atmosphere. The impact area covered 190 million square kilometers, similar in area to the planet's Little Red Spot and approximately the size of the Pacific Ocean . [ 3 ]
The Great Red Spot on Jupiter is, by far, the largest extraterrestrial anticyclone (or cyclone) known. The Great Red Spot is located in the southern hemisphere and has wind speeds greater than any storm ever measured on Earth. New data from Juno found that the storm penetrates into Jupiter's atmosphere about 320 km (200 mi).
Jupiter's moons were classified into four groups of four, based on their similar orbital elements. [204] This picture has been complicated by the discovery of numerous small outer moons since 1999. Jupiter's moons are divided into several different groups, although there are two known moons which are not part of any group (Themisto and Valetudo ...