Dear Members,
Please download the latest AAWE newsletter, The Wind Engineer August 2022.
In my last letter, I mentioned my fondness for science fiction and novels about planetary travel. I’ve been pretty excited during the past couple of weeks to see lots of (real) images from space. In recent days, images of Jupiter from the James Webb Space Telescope, an international program of NASA, with the European Space Agency and the Canadian Space Agency, have been published. Jupiter, as shown in the adjacent figure fromblogs.nasa.gov, is the largest planet in our solar system, and it is home to the largest storm in the system. The Great Red Spot (GRS) of Jupiter is a huge storm that has been swirling for centuries. The GRS actually looks white in the image due to the coloration used in processing. This storm is 10,000 miles across – the diameter of Earth is 7917.5 miles – and it has been observed for about 200 years. Can you imagine a 200-year storm on Earth? Recent observations suggest that the GRS may be shrinking, but it is not clear if it will continue to get smaller. Wind engineers of the future will have to contend with these types of issues when planet colonization begins. Lots of possibilities await.
With best wishes,
Dorothy