The atmosphere of a gas giant!

[RangerPL]

Uranus and Neptune are ice giants not gas giants, because they are made of different gases than Jupiter and Saturn. They are also far away from the sun. Uranus has the coldest temperature of any planet with a dense atmosphere.

 

[Jarvitä]

I remember reading somewhere a long time ago that at certain altitudes in Jupiter's (or was it Saturn's?) atmosphere, the pressure and temperature are perfectly normal for Earth conditions and there are no particularly toxic atmospheric gases, so humans could survive there in normal clothing and scuba gear. Can anyone confirm that?

 

[tomek]

Don't know about "normal clothing and scuba gear", but it is theoretically possible to make a floating station in the outer Jupiter's atmosphere (similar to Artlav's Shukra station add-on). Keeping it out of trouble (like getting sucked into one of those storm vortexes) might be hard though. And gravity there would be twice that on Earth.

 

[Jarvitä]

Don't know about "normal clothing and scuba gear", but it is theoretically possible to make a floating station in the outer Jupiter's atmosphere (similar to Artlav's Shukra station add-on). Keeping it out of trouble (like getting sucked into one of those storm vortexes) might be hard though. And gravity there would be twice that on Earth.

Wikipedia cites "equatorial surface gravity" (Jupiter has a surface?) at 2.528g. I'm not sure what their reference is for "surface", but I'm pretty sure it's well below the point in it's atmosphere where the pressure is only around 100kPa, and gravitational force is decreased by the square of distance.

 

[Pilot7893]

Fun Fact: Did you know Uranus was almost named George after King George?

 

[RangerPL]

Fun Fact: Did you know Uranus was almost named George after King George?

That'd be huge disappointment.

 

[John_L]

I used the scenario editor to cheat myself on Saturn, then raised my altitude really really high, then fired the engines to get the tangential velocity, and cheated my way into orbit. I'm not that great at getting anyplace besides the moon or ISS (or anything in earth orbit). I've never really had to orbit the biggies like Jupiter or Saturn. Man, some crazy numbers to orbit! Check out this photo I snapped after passing through the rings...

http://www.flickr.com/photos/8445976@N02/2772670243/

 

[Urwumpe]

Fun Fact: Did you know Uranus was almost named George after King George?

Not "George". "Georgium Sidus", or "George's Star" when translated from Latin to English.

 

[TMac3000]

Jupiter in the movie 2001, Saturn in the book, and Neptune in Event Horizon. When is a good sci-fi movie going to feature Uranus? Between the green color and that unique vertical ring system, it's my favorite planet.

As for the atmosphere, assuming a craft could survive, I bet it's creepy as hell down there.

 

[penlu]

Even though you're all the way out at Neptune, the other stars are still hundreds of thousands of (maybe) millions of times farther out. Never underestimate distances outside of our solar system... or even within...

 

[Cairan]

When is a good sci-fi movie going to feature Uranus?

Never. With all the fart-jokes around with that planet's name floating out there, no producer or studio exec would ever want to have the name of that planet in any promo material. Imagine if the movie sucks what play on words would be...

 

[TMac3000]

Never. With all the fart-jokes around with that planet's name floating out there, no producer or studio exec would ever want to have the name of that planet in any promo material. Imagine if the movie sucks what play on words would be...

But wouldn't pronouncing it "YOUR-a-nus" alleviate some of the jokes? Or would that just lead to jokes about urine?