Amalthea – The Largest Inner Moon Of Jupiter

More Cool & Interesting Facts About Amalthea!

• Amalthea was the last moon of any planet in the Solar System to be discovered from Earth using direct visual observation. All subsequent discoveries were made using photographic plates, space probes or the Hubble Space Telescope.
• The name comes from Greek mythology, Amalthea was a naiad who nursed the new-born god Jupiter.
• Amalthea is the reddest object in the Solar System that has been discovered! Isn’t that weird?!
• It has a similar appearance to many of Jupiter’s other small moons and is likely to have been a captured asteroid which formed in a different part of the Solar System, possibly the Asteroid Belt.
• The little red moon is the 3^rd and largest of the 4 small inner moons and like the others, it is tidally locked – meaning the same side always faces Jupiter!
• From the surface, Jupiter would appear to be over 46 degrees wide in the sky! Basically, this means Jupiter would fill a quarter of the sky!
• The second largest crater Gaea is almost approximately 80 km in diameter and estimated to be 16 km in depth!
• The Inner moon Amalthea and one of the other small inner moons of Jupiter, Thebe, provide the material for the Gossamer Ring.
• On account of the close orbit to Jupiter, the inner moons are constantly exposed to high levels of radiation produced by the intense Jovian magnetosphere!
• Close up images have been taken by Voyager 1 and 2, and the Galileo orbiter spacecraft.
• On account of Amalthea orbiting so close to Jupiter, its orbit will eventually decay due to tidal forces (and later atmospheric drag) causing the moon to either breakup or impact with Jupiter!