Anna: Welcome to Astronomy Daily, the podcast
bringing you the biggest news from across the
cosmos. I'm Anna.
Avery: And I'm Avery. And today we're covering
everything from unexpected setbacks to
groundbreaking discoveries.
Anna: That's right on the docket. Today we'll be
discussing a significant anomaly during
testing for SpaceX's next generation
Starship booster.
Avery: Then we'll look at a mysterious stealth solar
storm that struck Earth without any warning.
We'll also dive into new research that
suggests ancient Mars may have been habitable
for much longer than previously believed.
Anna: And to round things out, we have an update on
a Welsh startup testing a unique balloon
assisted rocket. And we'll check in on the
Bepi Colombo mission, which is now just one
year away from its destination, the planet
Mercury.
Avery: Let's get started then.
Anna: It's a lot to get through, so let's start
with the big news from Starbase.
Avery: All right, our first story is a major
development in the Starship program.
SpaceX has been preparing its next generation
of boosters, known as Block 3, for testing,
but they've hit a serious snag. On
November 21, Booster 18 was
undergoing a routine gas system pressure test
when its liquid oxygen tank ruptured.
Anna: Ruptured is a gentle way of putting it. From
the photos, it looks like a massive hole was
torn in the side of the vehicle.
Avery: Exactly. SpaceX confirmed the anomaly,
stating that no propellant was on board and
no engines were installed yet. But the damage
is extensive. Early analysis
suggests that a CoPV, which is a
composite overwrapped pressure vessel,
might have failed at the bottom of the
booster.
Anna: So one of those high pressure tanks likely
exploded?
Avery: That's the theory. It seems to have set off a
chain reaction, blowing out other COPVs
along a structural chine and leading to the
main tank rupture. What's remarkable is that
the booster didn't immediately tip over. It's
currently being held up by the new larger
liquid MET transfer tube, and the teams are
figuring out how to safely secure it.
Anna: That sounds incredibly precarious.
So what does this mean for the program's
schedule? This was the first of the new Block
3 boosters, right?
Avery: It was. And this failure leaves them with
zero completed flight ready boosters. They'll
have to shift their focus entirely to the
next one in line, Booster 19. It's
definitely not the start to the Block 3 era
that SpaceX wanted, of.
Anna: Course, but I suppose there is a silver
lining.
Avery: There is. As frustrating as this is for them,
it's far better that this happened during a
ground test at their Massey site than during
a 33 engine static fire on the launch pad,
or worse, during an actual flight. This is
why they test. They find the flaw, fix it,
and make the next vehicle stronger.
Anna: From a, uh, failure on the ground to a
disruption from the sky.
Our next story is about a stealth
solar storm that hit Earth on November 20.
It arrived almost completely without warning
and was responsible for some beautiful
auroras seen at lower than usual latitudes.
Avery: So what makes a solar storm stealthy? I
usually think of them as these massive,
obvious explosions on the sun.
Anna: That's typically the case. A regular
coronal mass ejection, or cme, is
very visible in solar data, often
accompanied by a bright solar flare.
Stealth CMEs are the opposite, and they
erupt quietly without any bright signatures.
They tend to be faint, slow moving, and
incredibly difficult to track.
Avery: So we often don't even know they're coming
until they're already here.
Anna: Exactly. That's what happened on November
20th. Forecasters at NOAA only
noticed it when they saw a, uh, disruption in
the solar wind conditions around Earth. They
called it an embedded transient. The
magnetic field carried by the solar wind,
which is normally around 4 to 6
nanoteslas, briefly spiked to 18.
Avery: That's a significant jump. And this, combined
with a fast solar windstream from a coronal
hole, is what likely triggered those auroras
seen in places like Maine and Denmark.
Anna: That's the leading hypothesis. This event
didn't trigger a major geomagnetic
storm, thankfully, but it highlights a
known challenge for space weather
forecasting. A 2021 study
confirmed that these stealth eruptions
can come from seemingly quiet regions of the
sun, yet still pack a magnetic
punch when they reach us. They're a
quiet threat that scientists are working
hard to better understand and predict.
Avery: Next up, let's talk about a different
approach to reaching orbit. A well, startup
called B2Space has just completed a
key test of its launch system, which is known
as a raccoon.
Anna: A raccoon, as in a
rocket and a balloon combined?
Avery: Precisely. The idea is to use a large
high altitude balloon to carry a solid fuel
rocket up through the thickest part of the
atmosphere. Then once it's at a very high
altitude, the rocket launches. It saves
a tremendous amount of fuel you'd normally
use just to fight through that dense lower
air.
Anna: That's a clever concept. So what did
this Recent test involve?
Avery: B2Space conducted the test from the Canary
Islands. They launched the balloon carrying a
smaller, lower powered version of their
eventual rocket. The balloon ascended to an
altitude of 21.5 kilometers.
That's about 70,000ft, at
which point the rocket successfully launched.
Anna: Incredible. Was the system reusable?
Avery: It was. The company confirmed that all
elements of the launch system were
successfully recovered. After the test, their
next step is to repeat this test with a
larger, more powerful rocket in April
2026. The ultimate goal is to have
their operational system carry payloads of up
to 200 kg to low earth
orbit, with the balloon releasing the rocket
at an even higher altitude of 35
km. It's a fascinating and
potentially cost effective way to serve the
small satellite market.
Anna: From innovative launch systems to new
discoveries on other worlds, our next
story takes us to Mars, where new research
is chang our understanding of the planet's
past. Scientists at New York University,
Abu Dhabi, have found evidence that
ancient sand dunes inside the Gale Crater
were gradually turned into rock by
interacting with underground water billions
of years ago.
Avery: Wow. So this suggests Mars had liquid water
for a lot longer than we thought.
Anna: Potentially, yes. The research team
examined data from the Curiosity rover
looking at a feature called the Stimson
formation. These are what's known as
lithified formations, basically sand
dunes that hardened into stone. The thinking
was that this probably happened
during Mars's wet Noachian period,
about 4 billion years ago. Okay,
so what's new here? The team determined that
these rock formations were actually the
product of late stage aqueous
activity. This means the water that
hardened the dunes didn't come from ancient
floods, but from groundwater seed creeping
from the nearby mountain, Mount Sharp.
Much later in Mars history, they
even found minerals like gypsum, um, left
behind, which points to this interaction with
groundwater.
Avery: That's a huge deal. It extends the timeline
for when Mars might have had liquid water and
therefore been potentially habitable.
Anna: Exactly, and it gets even more
exciting. On Earth, similar sandstone
deposits contain some of our planet's ocean
oldest evidence of life, like communities
of microorganisms. The research team
believes that these lithified dunes in the
Gale Crater could be prime candidates for
finding the preserved remains of ancient
Martian bacteria.
Avery: So this not only rewrites a bit of Mars
geological history, but it also gives us a
fantastic new target in the search for life.
Anna: That's right. It suggests these sites
are where future missions should be looking
if they want to find evidence of past or,
or even present life on Mars.
Avery: Finally, let's check in on a mission that's
been cruising through the inner solar system
for over seven years. The joint ESA
and JAXA BepiColombo mission is now just
one year away from arriving at its final
destination, Mercury.
Anna: It's been a Long journey. The mission has
already completed numerous flybys. One of
Earth, two of Venus, and six of
Mercury itself. Two just to slow down enough
to be captured by the planet's gravity.
Avery: And even those flybys have produced great
science. A, uh, key highlight has been the
measurements of Mercury's magnetic
environment. We're still trying to understand
exactly how the planet's magnetic field
works. And BepiColombo has already given
us the first measurements from low over the
Southern hemisphere, helping to build a
better map.
Anna: And of course, we've gotten some incredible
photos from the monitoring cameras, the so
called selfie cams.
Avery: Absolutely. But the main science phase begins
in about a year when the two spacecraft,
ESA's Mercury Planetary Orbiter, or
MPO, and JAXA's Mercury
Magnetospheric Orbiter, known as MIO,
finally separate and enter their own orbits.
Anna: And this will be the first time Mercury is
studied by two spacecraft
simultaneously. Why is that dual
approach so important?
Avery: It gives them a huge advantage. MPO will
orbit very close to the planet's surface,
while MIO will be in a larger, more
elliptical orbit. This allows them to study
how the solar wind interacts with Mercury's
magnetic field from two different
perspectives. @ the same time, MPO
will be mapping the surface in incredible
detail, determining its composition and
temperature.
Anna: And it will also get a look at those
permanently shadowed craters at the poles,
right?
Avery: Yes, it will. Peering into those craters is
one of the mission's top priorities. If there
is water ice on Mercury, that's where we
expect to find it. After a long cruise,
BepiColombo is on the final stretch to
unlocking the secrets of the solar system's
innermost planet.
Anna: And that is all the time we have for today.
From setbacks at Starbase to stealth
storms, and from raccoons to revelations on
Mars, it's been a busy time in space.
Avery: It really shows how much is constantly
happening, both in our own celestial
neighborhood and in our efforts to explore
it. Thank you for joining us on Astronomy
Daily.
Anna: Be sure to subscribe wherever you get your
podcasts, and join us next time for another
look at the universe.
Avery: Clear skies and keep looking up.