On March 17, 2016, the largest planet in the solar system was struck by an asteroid or a comet, and some amateur stargazers captured the planet’s latest collision on camera.
Amateur astronomer John McKeon was observing Jupiter by telescope from Swords, Ireland, on March 17 when he captured a photo of something slamming into the surface of the planet, causing a bright burst of light. McKeon was recording the transit of Jupiter’s moons Io and Ganymede with an 11-inch Schmidt-Cassegrain telescope and his digital camera when the asteroid struck.
NASA asteroid expert Paul Chodas, who heads the agency’s Center for Near-Earth Object Studies at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, California, said the probability is highest that an asteroid, not a comet, struck Jupiter.
This isn’t the first time Jupiter has been struck by an asteroid or comet. According to Chodas, ”From our point of view this simply serves to remind us that impacts in the solar system are real and Jupiter gets more than its fair share of impacts. It draws in a lot of asteroids and comets. We are seeing these impact flashes on Jupiter about once a year now.”
Between July 16 and July 22 of 1994, astronomers watched in awe as fragments of the comet Shoemaker-Levy 9 slammed into Jupiter. The impacts left dark scars in Jupiter’s atmosphere that were visible for months through even a small telescope. Jupiter is basically just a big ball of gas, with no real hard surface until, at a certain depth, the gas becomes dense enough to be considered hard.