NASA spacecraft snaps ‘face figure’ on Jupiter during close flyby of the planet

A recent image taken in space is turning heads and sparking questions. 

On Sept. 7, 2023, NASA’s Juno mission captured an image of an area in one of Jupiter’s northern regions called Jet N7, according to NASA. 

The image, which is of clouds and storms, caught the attention of scientists as they were studying the features.

NASA said that the clouds on Jupiter led scientists to pareidolia — which is the effect “that causes observers to perceive faces or other patterns in largely random patterns.”

Citizen scientist Vladimir Tarasov was the one who made the image from the Juno instrument when the spacecraft was about 4,800 miles above Jupiter’s clouds, according to a NASA report. 

Images show what appears to be a face with two eyes, a nose, and a mouth. 

NASA noted that the raw images are available to the public for further evaluation. 

Although intriguing, this is not the first time NASA has captured an image of what appears to be a face on a planet. 

In 1976, NASA captured its well-known “Face on Mars” photo — which turned out to be just an ordinary mesa.

The photo was taken by NASA’s Viking 1 spacecraft; in the image, the carving of eyes, a nose, and a mouth seem to appear on the planet. 

While “scientists figured it was just another Martian mesa, common enough around Cydonia,” with some “unusual shadows” — the image caused a bit of a stir among the public. 

A similar image was taken in 2001 with no clouds on Mars to prove that the face once thought to be found was not apparent.