Space News Today

Astronomy Daily · S05E163 · “The Long Way Home” · Monday 10 August 2026. Sources verified against primary / institutional outlets. Starship “lost at sea” (Flight 13) • Flight 13 launched 24 July 2026 from Starbase, South Texas; the upper stage (“Ship,” Ship 40, ~52 m) made the softest Starship water landing yet in the Indian Ocean off Western Australia — and, in a program first, survived intact and afloat. • SpaceX had not planned to recover it. Musk confirmed the salvage attempt on 28 July (“We’re sending a ship out to recover Starship”); recovery ship Go Australis was joined by Norwegian tugs Normand Ranger and Skimmer Tide, with a tow line to the nose. • On 7 August, Musk said recovery is “not looking good right now” in rough seas — but the team had already obtained close-up photos of critical heat-shield and engine regions for future upgrades. A saltwater-soaked Ship was never going to be reflown. • Heat shield: on SpaceX’s first quarterly earnings call (4 August) Musk said he’d “consider the heat-shield problem solved,” long the biggest hurdle to full reuse. • The flight also deployed 20 next-gen Starlink V3 satellites; the Super Heavy booster had engine trouble and was lost in the Gulf of Mexico. Stacked, Starship stands ~124 m. Flight 14 is targeted for late August — its first attempt at operational orbit with production Starlink. • Sources: SpaceX / @elonmusk on X (7 Aug); Space.com (Mike Wall, 7 Aug); CNN (3 Aug). Landspace Zhuque-3, second landing attempt • Landspace (private, Beijing, founded 2015) targets liftoff ~7:45 p.m. EDT Mon 10 Aug (23:45 UTC / ≈9:45 a.m. AEST Tue 11 Aug) from Jiuquan, aiming for a propulsive first-stage recovery on legs (Falcon 9-style), landing downrange in Gansu. • The methalox, stainless-steel Zhuque-3 (~66 m) is broadly a Falcon 9 rival. Its Dec 2025 maiden flight reached orbit but the first stage failed its landing burn and crashed. • Accuracy note: this is China’s fourth orbital-class recovery attempt. A Long March 10B already landed via net-capture on 10 July (China became the 2nd nation to land an orbital booster) — so tonight would make Landspace the first Chinese company to attempt a propulsive/landing-legs recovery, not “China’s first.” • Sources: Space.com (7 Aug); Yahoo/Space (7 Aug); launch trackers (NOTAM-based). Uranus’s “breathing” bow shock • New multifluid-MHD modelling shows Uranus’s bow shock expands and contracts over a single ~17-hour Uranian day — driven by the planet’s own extreme rotation and tilted, offset magnetic field, not by changes in the solar wind. • The model is constrained by Voyager 2’s 1986 flyby — still the only direct measurements ever taken inside the Uranian system (a nice callback to E159’s Voyager 2 “Big Bang” lead). • Implications for future ice-giant missions and for the many ice-giant exoplanets now being found. Cao et al., AGU Advances; surfaced via an Eos research spotlight this week. (Framed as newly-spotlighted rather than newly-published.) • Sources: AGU Advances (Cao et al.); Eos research spotlight; phys.org (7 Aug). Total solar eclipse — 12 August 2026 • The only total solar eclipse of 2026. Unusual over-the-pole path: Arctic Siberia → eastern Greenland → western Iceland → northern Spain (clipping NE Portugal) → the Balearics at sunset. • Greatest eclipse ≈17:46 UTC; max totality 2 min 18 s just off Iceland’s west coast, with the Sun only ~26° high. Iceland’s first total eclipse since 1954 (Reykjavik’s first in 593 years); Spain’s first since 1905. • North America sees a partial across the northern tier (Alaska to North Carolina) and most of Canada — deepest in the far north, a shallow bite (10%) from the US Northeast, late morning to early afternoon local. NASA livestream from 1:15 p.m. EDT at nasa.gov/live. • Not visible from the Southern Hemisphere. Sources: NASA eclipse pages; national eclipse guides. Skywatch — both hemispheres • Perseids peak the night of 12–13 August under a new Moon — excellent for the Northern Hemisphere (up to ~50–100/hr from dark sites, best pre-dawn 13 Aug); modest and low for the Southern Hemisphere. • Southern-Hemisphere targets: a pre-dawn planet spread; brilliant evening Venus (brightest ~22 Sep); Comet 10P/Tempel 2 low in the pre-dawn south (binoculars/small scope, dark site). • Aurora watch: a G2 storm produced auroras 7–9 Aug; more activity is possible around 11–12 Aug for high-latitude watchers. • Eye safety: certified ISO 12312-2 eclipse glasses required for all partial phases; never view the Sun through an unfiltered camera, binoculars or telescope.





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In this engaging Q&A episode of Space Nuts, join host Andrew Dunkley and astronomer Fred Watson Watson as they tackle a variety of fascinating questions from listeners. From the peculiarities of Martian days to the mysteries of black holes and the galactic centre, this episode is filled with enlightening discussions that are sure to spark curiosity about the cosmos.


In this episode:


- John asks about the implications of Mars' longer day length on human biology and potential adaptations for future colonists.


- Dan inquires about the growth of black holes, exploring how quickly they can develop into supermassive entities and what happens when there’s nothing left to consume.


- Young Thomas, just 11 years old, poses several intriguing questions about the galactic centre, including whether it can swallow all stars and planets in the galaxy, and the limits of a black hole's gravitational reach.


- Paul reflects on historical discoveries in astronomy, specifically how Harlow Shapley determined our Sun's position within the Milky Way, challenging the long-held belief that it was at the centre.


Join Andrew and Fred Watson as they explore these thought-provoking questions and more, encouraging listeners to continue their journey of exploration and discovery in the universe.


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(00:00) This is a Q and A edition where we take audience questions


(02:16) When and if Mars is populated with humans, how would we work with longer day


(08:50) Andrew: How astronauts deal with gravity when they land on Earth


(11:47) Dan from the Gold coast has some questions about black holes


(12:51) Fred: How fast do black holes grow? Dan asks fundamental astrophysics question


(18:17) Fred asks five questions about black holes from Thomas Reid, 11


(22:03) Thomas asks if black holes can swallow up all stars and planets


(24:31) Final question comes from Paul from Las Vegas


(26:42) It was actually 1919 when that discovery was made


(34:24) We continue to receive great questions from great listeners and long may it continue


Episode link: https://play.headliner.app/episode/34693771?utm_source=youtube

This weekend on Astronomy Daily: the Inouye Solar Telescope reveals whirlpools on the Sun’s surface for the first time, a Falcon 9 upper stage carves a fresh crater on the Moon, Voyager 2 pulls off a daring "Big Bang" power swap 21 billion kilometres away, and the LINK spacecraft wins its de-spin battle in the race to save NASA’s Swift. Plus your both-hemispheres guide to the 12 August total solar eclipse and the moonless Perseid peak. In this episode ● (01:20) LEAD — First-ever sighting of Kelvin–Helmholtz vortices on the Sun (Nature, 5 Aug; Inouye Solar Telescope / NSO / MPS) ● (09:00) Falcon 9 upper stage 2025-010D impacts the Moon near Einstein Crater ● (12:15) Voyager 2’s "Big Bang" power swap buys another year of interstellar science ● (15:30) LINK spins down from 9°/s to 1.47°/s — software update next in the Swift rescue ● (18:45) Skywatch: 12 Aug total solar eclipse + Perseid peak — both hemispheres, with eye-safety Links & sources ● Nature: Kuridze et al., "Ubiquitous Kelvin–Helmholtz instabilities driving plasma mixing on the Sun" (5 Aug 2026) ● NSO / NSF and Max Planck Institute for Solar System Research press releases (5 Aug 2026) ● NASA/JPL Voyager blog: "NASA Engineers Help Prolong Voyager 2’s Science Mission" (4 Aug 2026) ● NASA Science Swift blog: LINK stabilisation update; ESA & NASA eclipse pages for 12 Aug 2026





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Astronomy Daily · S05E161 · “The Colour of Empty Space” · Friday 7 August 2026. Hosts: Anna & Avery. astronomydaily.io · @AstroDailyPod ① Vacuum birefringence: reading a magnetar ● NASA’s IXPE, with NICER and the Parkes/Murriyang radio telescope (NSW), measured the polarised X-rays of magnetar 1E 1547.0−5408. ● Result: soft X-ray polarisation ~65% at 2 keV, rising to nearly 80% at some rotation phases — the strongest signal yet of vacuum birefringence, a QED effect predicted by Heisenberg in 1936. ● The team calls it the “most definitive signal to date,” not a confirmed detection; an April 2026 analysis disputes it under different geometry. Co-leads: Rachael Stewart; Hoa Dinh Thi (Rice); with Marcus Lower (Swinburne). ● Source: Stewart et al., Nature, 5 Aug 2026 (DOI 10.1038/s41586-026-10859-z); NASA IXPE release. ② Gateway HALO hardware → Lunar Infrastructure Demos ● NASA and Northrop Grumman are repurposing the HALO module’s power, data and avionics into three surface missions — LID-1, LID-2, LID-3. ● Goal: “survive-the-night” power and thermal tech for the lunar South Pole, where night lasts ~14 Earth days and temperatures plunge below −200 °C. ● Part of a wider Moon-base update in which four commercial landers reached final qualification testing at once. ● Source: NASA & Northrop Grumman releases, 4 Aug 2026; Spaceflight Now. ③ New Glenn: the cause is a valve ● Blue Origin traced the 28 May New Glenn booster explosion (during a pad hot-fire at Cape Canaveral) to the main oxygen valve on one of the seven BE-4 engines. ● Fix: small, retrofittable valve modifications; return to flight still targeted by year’s end. The BE-4 also powers ULA’s Vulcan. ● Source: Blue Origin CEO Dave Limp, 5 Aug 2026; SpaceNews. ④ LINK’s de-spin: the fight to save Swift ● Katalyst Space’s LINK robot — tasked with boosting NASA’s ageing Swift observatory before re-entry — hit a multi-axis tumble when two of three reaction wheels failed. ● Using gimballed electric-propulsion thrusters, the team cut the spin from ~9°/s to ~1.47°/s on under 100 g of propellant. A flight-software update is next; rendezvous slips to ~end of August. ● Source: NASA Swift blog, 6 Aug 2026; Katalyst mission updates. ⑤ Skywatch: eclipse + Perseids ● 12 Aug total solar eclipse — totality across Greenland, Iceland, northern Spain; afternoon partial for eastern Canada and the NE United States (10% only NE of the NYC–Rochester line; ~50% in Atlantic Canada). NASA live from 1:15 pm EDT. ● Perseid peak the night of 12–13 Aug under a New Moon — up to ~100/hr from dark rural sites. ● Southern Hemisphere: eclipse not visible; Perseids barely clear the horizon. Sydney: pre-dawn planet line-up + Venus + winter Milky Way. ● EYE SAFETY: use only ISO 12312-2 eclipse glasses for every partial phase; never combine them with a camera, telescope or binoculars.








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Landslides on Pluto and China's SpaceX-like Rocket Recovery Success


Discover the intriguing discovery of landslides on Pluto, explained through recent image analysis from the New Horizons spacecraft, and learn how these features provide clues about the dwarf planet's geological activity. Plus, explore China's recent achievement in rocket recovery, mimicking SpaceX's successful landing techniques with innovative net capture technology, signaling a significant step forward in space debris management and reusability.


Fred Watson and Andrew Dunkley discuss recent scientific findings on landslides around Sputnik Planitia on Pluto


How climate change on Earth is increasing landslide activity, and how similar processes might be happening on other worlds


The significance of the 2015 flyby of Pluto by the New Horizons spacecraft and what it revealed about planetary geology


Details of China's recent successful rocket booster recovery using a net and its potential impact on space launch economics


Comparison between China's new net capture method and SpaceX's chopsticks system for booster recovery


The rapid advancement of Chinese space capabilities, including lunar and space station missions


The broader context of international space race dynamics and the race to return humans to the Moon


UAP Study Group Led by Avi Loeb and the Search for Extraterrestrial Phenomena


Get an inside look at the White House-formed UAP science advisory council led by Harvard's Avi Loeb, emphasizing scientific rigor in studying unidentified anomalous phenomena. The discussion covers the composition of the council, the importance of unbiased research, and the challenges of interpreting mysterious aerial objects observed over the years.


The formation and purpose of the UAP Science Advisory Council, chaired by Avi Loeb


The diverse backgrounds of experts involved, including physicists, military personnel, computer scientists, and psychologists


How modern technology and data are transforming the study of UAPs, with government and military reports analyzed over decades


The debate over the nature of UAPs: natural phenomena, advanced human technology, or potential extraterrestrial origins


The cultural and political implications of gaps in understanding these phenomena and the importance of scientific methodology


Reader comments reflecting skepticism and intrigue about the investigations and the sensationalism surrounding UAP research





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