Can you imagine being stuck in a thunderstorm that lasts up to seven months at the same intensity? Well, thank goodness we don’t live in the Northern Hemisphere of Saturn. I figured since not much is going on weather-wise in and around central Pennsylvania, we should take a look at the interesting weather occurring on other planets. Scientists have been tracking a storm on Saturn since December after a telescope revealed a "Great White Spot," and ever since the spot has held that name just like the Great Red Spot for Jupiter’s hurricane-like storm that has been raging for centuries. Radio outbursts created by lightning strikes were then tracked and confirmed by the orbiting space shuttle Cassini. Since then, scientists have been tracking the storm’s turbulent nature and have come to find that the storm takes up an area that is eight times the surface area of Earth. The storm itself wraps around the whole surface of Saturn, covering 2 billion miles.
In relation to Earth’s lightning strikes, this storm experiences strikes that are electrically 10,000 times stronger and scientists have recorded ten lightning strikes in a second. If our lightning strikes turn off our power, I don’t even want to think about the damage a Saturn lightning strike would cause. This is not the only storm Saturn has seen, but scientists are still unsure how these storms develop; some evidence could link it to the change in seasons. Take a look at photos of the storm and listen to its lightning strikes here--> http://saturn.jpl.nasa.gov/news/cassinifeatures/feature20110706b/
--Weather Intern Jacqueline Layer
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