spacetoday.net: Tropical storm discovered on Titan

Tropical storm discovered on Titan

Posted: Thu, Aug 13, 2009, 11:32 AM ET (1532 GMT)
Titan storm seen in April 2008 (Gemini Obs.)

Scientists have detected a storm in the equatorial regions in the otherwise "very bland" atmosphere of Saturn's moon Titan. In a paper in the current issue of the journal Nature, scientists reported the detection of the tropical storm, observed by the Gemini Observatory in Hawaii in April 2008. The storm lasted several days, and had a ripple effect across the atmosphere, creating cloud formations elsewhere on the planet. The discovery is considered significant since it may explain why the moon's equatorial regions, previously thought to be too dry to support clouds, have geological features like channels and streams usually linked to precipitation.