There’s a lot of water in Jupiter’s atmosphere, thanks to comet impact

Dark scars in Jupiter's upper atmosphere created by the Shoemaker-Levy 9 impact in 1994, as photographed by the Hubble Space Telescope. Credit: Hubble Space Telescope / NASA
Dark scars in Jupiter’s upper atmosphere created by the Shoemaker-Levy 9 impact in 1994, as photographed by the Hubble Space Telescope. Credit: Hubble Space Telescope / NASA

The impact of comet Shoemaker-Levy 9 into Jupiter in 1994 was a spectacular event for astronomers. The scars in Jupiter’s atmosphere lasted for weeks afterward; while those have long since faded, there are still other features of the impact visible even now, it was announced last Tuesday.

Read MoreThere’s a lot of water in Jupiter’s atmosphere, thanks to comet impact