During a flyby of Jupiter’s moon Io on December 27, 2024, NASA’s Juno spacecraft discovered a massive volcanic hotspot in Io’s southern hemisphere.

This hotspot, larger than Earth’s Lake Superior, emits eruptions with six times the energy of all the world’s power plants.

Io, the most volcanic body in the solar system, experiences intense activity due to Jupiter’s gravitational pull.

Juno’s infrared instrument, JIRAM, captured the hotspot, which spans 40,000 square miles and radiates over 80 trillion watts of power, Earth Sky.org has reported.

The discovery will be further studied in future flybys, with potential changes in the region to be monitored.

Written by B.C. Begley