As Juno was preparing itself to enter Jupiter’s atmosphere, it was already broadcasting some information to Earth. Particularly, it sent over these creepy sounds recorded around the gas giant.
These fascinating and puzzling sounds were recorded by Juno’s Wave instrument as the spacecraft crossed the boundary Jupiter’s magnetic field on June 24. While there are still some questions to answer about the sounds, we do know that they originate from the ‘bow shock‘ caused when Juno entered Jupiter’s magnetic field. In a way, it’s kind of like a sonic boom created when an aircraft exceeds the speed of sound.
Just like the magnetic field on Earth protects us from solar wind, so too does Jupiter’s magnetic field, but Jupiter’s field is much stronger than Earth’s. The bow shock lasted almost two hours, which is really impressive when you consider that the spacecraft was travelling at a speed of 241,000 km/h (150,000 mph).
