Wind speed on Venus has reached an all-time high - Russian Newspaper

Planet Venus astronomers presented a surprise: it turns out, the speed of rotation of its atmosphere is constantly growing.

Russian astronomers from the Space Research Institute in Moscow, who conducted the study along with Japanese colleagues, found that the atmosphere of Venus, for unknown reasons, “gaining momentum”.

An analysis of the data of the spacecraft “Venus Express” in the period from 2006 to 2012 the average wind speed on the planet has increased by 33 percent – from about 300 km / h to 400 km / h, according to Space.com. According to scientists, this is a very high growth, given the already frenzied speed Venusian winds.

Venus has long attracted the attention of scientists as a planet with an abnormally fast rotating atmosphere. According to astronomers, almost the whole atmosphere of Venus is involved in one big giant hurricane. Cloud cover the planet rotates from east to west with a period of four Earth days. Thus one revolution around its axis of Venus makes for 243 Earth days.

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“Our analysis of the movement of clouds at low latitudes of the Southern Hemisphere showed that the wind speed increased to 70 km / h in 255 Earth days – it is little more than a Venusian year” – said a Japanese scientist Thor Kouyama of the Research Institute for Information technology Ibiraki.

Atmosphere “Sisters of the Earth”, also known as Venus, in general is of great interest for research. For example, we know that lightning hit her twice more frequently than in the earth. This phenomenon is called “electric dragon Venus”. Also, scientists had discovered the ozone layer, which is located at an altitude of about 100 km and contains hundreds of times less ozone than the Earth’s. Presumably, it is formed under the influence of solar radiation from carbon dioxide.