Jp. Maillard et al., METHANE AND CARBON-MONOXIDE INFRARED EMISSIONS OBSERVED AT THE CANADA-FRANCE-HAWAII TELESCOPE DURING THE COLLISION OF COMET SL-9 WITH JUPITER, Geophysical research letters, 22(12), 1995, pp. 1573-1576
Observations with the Fourier Transform Spectrometer were conducted in
spectral ranges from 1.6 to 4.7 mu m, from July 17 to 21 (UT) on the
hot plumes appearing on the limb as well as hours or days after the im
pacts. We present here an analysis of the methane emission observed at
3.3 mu m some 10 min after the C impact, indicating the presence of a
very small (less than 100 km wide) hot region with temperatures in th
e 750-1500 K range within the 0.1- to 0.01-mbar region. We also report
the detection of CO emission at 4.7 mu m 4.5 hrs after the L impact,
indicative of a temperature of 274 +/- 10 K at the similar to 10(16) C
O molec cm(-2) level. The observations suggest that the stratospheric
temperature decreases with depth by at least 30 K over two CO pressure
decades.