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Saturn storm.
Water ice dredged up from deep in Saturn's atmosphere by a monster storm marks the first time such ice has been detected so high, U.S. scientists say.
In a paper published in the journal Icarus, researchers say the storm in late 2010 -- as large as any storm ever observed on the planet -- churned up water ice from great depths that was subsequently detected by near-infrared measurements by NASA's Cassini spacecraft.
"The new finding from Cassini shows that Saturn can dredge up material from more than 100 miles," said Kevin Baines, a co-author of the paper who works at the University of Wisconsin-Madison and NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, Calif.
"It demonstrates in a very real sense that typically demure-looking Saturn can be just as explosive or even more so than typically stormy Jupiter."
Water ice, which originates from deep within the atmosphere of gas giant planets, doesn't appear to be lofted as high on Jupiter, the scientists said.
Read more: http://www.upi.com/Science_News/201...-atmosphere/UPI-62601378246231/#ixzz2dtDm9LC8
