IMPACT OF COMET SHOEMAKER-LEVY-9 ON JUPITER

Three-dimensional numerical simulations of the impact of Comet Shoemak er - Levy 9 on Jupiter and the resulting vapor plume expansion were co nducted using the Smoothed Particle Hydrodynamics (SPH) method. An icy body with a diameter of 2 km can penetrate to an altitude of -350 km (0 km = 1 bar) and most of the incident kinetic energy is transferred to the atmosphere between -100 km to -250 km. This energy is converted to potential energy of the resulting gas plume. The unconfined plume expands vertically and has a peak radiative power approximately equal to the total radiation from Jupiter's disc. The plume rises a few tens of atmospheric scale heights in approximately 10(2), seconds. The ris ing plume reaches the altitude of approximately 3000 km, but no atmosp heric gas is accelerated to the escape velocity (approximately 60 km/s ).