Story notes & sources 1 · Psyche phones home NASA’s Psyche spacecraft (launched 2023; arriving metal asteroid 16 Psyche in 2029) used a 15 May Mars gravity assist to test its instruments. The neutron spectrometer detected the anticipated count-rate enhancement near closest approach; the gamma-ray/neutron spectrometer, magnetometer and imager all performed well. Data and a month-long Mars time-lapse were released this week. ● NASA/JPL — “Psyche Mission Delivers Mars Flyby Data, Time-lapse Video” (17 Jul 2026) ● Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory — LLNL-built gamma-ray sensor’s first planetary measurements (17 Jul 2026) 2 · Plato clears its final exam ESA’s Plato — 26 cameras hunting Earth-like planets in the habitable zones of Sun-like stars — passed electromagnetic compatibility testing in the Maxwell chamber at ESTEC, its last major qualification hurdle. It’s bound for Sun-Earth L2 aboard an Ariane 6 (current target 2027). ● ESA — “Plato’s electronics ready for space” (20 Jul 2026) 3 · HENON space-weather CubeSat Presented at NAM 2026: HENON, a deep-space CubeSat that would sit ~15 million km upstream of Earth (10× farther than L1), potentially extending severe geomagnetic-storm warning from ~15 minutes to 2–3 hours. It carries the UK-built MAGIC magnetometer (Imperial College London) plus instruments from the Czech Republic and Finland, paving the way for a future European early-warning mission. ● Royal Astronomical Society / NAM 2026 — “From 15 minutes to 3 hours” (20 Jul 2026) 4 · The Sun’s “sleep” precursor Also at NAM 2026: a newly identified precursor in the solar cycle’s declining phase that could help predict the next maximum’s sunspot number. After the Sun’s active phase “switches off,” storms weaken and track a 27-day (solar-rotation) rhythm — pointing to co-rotating fast-wind streams rather than coronal mass ejections. ● Royal Astronomical Society / NAM 2026 — “How the Sun goes to ‘sleep’…” (20 Jul 2026) 5 · Building the ngVLA The US National Science Foundation, NSF NRAO and the US Naval Observatory are partnering on a pathfinder for the next-generation Very Large Array (ngVLA) — the ~266-antenna successor to the iconic VLA. The focus is very long baseline interferometry for ultra-sharp imaging and for maintaining the International Celestial Reference Frame. Construction/early operations are expected before the end of the decade. ● NSF NRAO / US Naval Observatory — ngVLA pathfinder partnership (17 Jul 2026) 6 · Skywatch: Southern Delta Aquariids Active mid-July to late August, peaking 29–30 July, with a radiant near Skat (δ Aquarii) — high overhead for Southern Hemisphere observers. ~15–20 faint, graceful meteors/hour under dark skies; suspected parent comet 96P/Machholz. A near-full Buck Moon spoils the peak, so the moon-free pre-dawn hours this week are the best window. Bright, slow Alpha Capricornid fireballs join in toward month’s end. ● Scientific American / EarthSky / American Meteor Society — Delta Aquariids 2026
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This episode includes AI-generated content.
00:00:00 --> 00:00:02 Anna: Picture Mars a small rusty
00:00:02 --> 00:00:05 coin hanging in the dark. Now watch it
00:00:05 --> 00:00:07 swell over a month until it fills your
00:00:07 --> 00:00:10 window and then shrink away behind you as
00:00:10 --> 00:00:13 you slingshot off toward a world made of
00:00:13 --> 00:00:13 metal.
00:00:14 --> 00:00:16 Avery: That's not a movie trailer, that's a real
00:00:16 --> 00:00:19 time lapse. A NASA spacecraft just sent
00:00:19 --> 00:00:21 home and it's where we're starting today.
00:00:21 --> 00:00:24 Anna: You're listening to Astronomy Daily. I'm
00:00:24 --> 00:00:24 Anna.
00:00:24 --> 00:00:27 Avery: And I'm avery. It's Tuesday 21st
00:00:27 --> 00:00:30 July, 2026, and this is your
00:00:30 --> 00:00:31 daily tour of the universe.
00:00:32 --> 00:00:34 Anna: On the show today, a metal asteroid probe
00:00:34 --> 00:00:37 phones home from Mars. Europe's next great
00:00:37 --> 00:00:40 planet hunter passes its final exam. And a
00:00:40 --> 00:00:43 shoebox sized satellite that could buy us
00:00:43 --> 00:00:45 hours of warning before the next solar storm.
00:00:46 --> 00:00:48 Avery: Plus, how the sun's quiet spell might
00:00:48 --> 00:00:51 forecast its next tantrum. The first
00:00:51 --> 00:00:53 pieces of a radio telescope that'll dwarf the
00:00:53 --> 00:00:56 one from the film Contact. And the meteor
00:00:56 --> 00:00:58 shower that for once is ours to keep down
00:00:58 --> 00:00:59 here in the south.
00:01:00 --> 00:01:01 Anna: Lots to get through. Let's go.
00:01:02 --> 00:01:05 So let's start with that time lapse. NASA's
00:01:05 --> 00:01:07 Psyche spacecraft is on a long, patient
00:01:07 --> 00:01:10 road trip. It launched back in 2023 and
00:01:10 --> 00:01:12 it's heading for one of the strangest
00:01:12 --> 00:01:15 destinations in the solar system. A metal
00:01:15 --> 00:01:18 rich asteroid called 16 Psyche. It
00:01:18 --> 00:01:20 won't arrive until 2029.
00:01:21 --> 00:01:23 Avery: Um, and to get there, it needed a shove back.
00:01:23 --> 00:01:26 On 15 May, it swung past Mars
00:01:26 --> 00:01:28 for a gravity assist, using the planet's
00:01:28 --> 00:01:31 gravity like a slingshot to bend its path and
00:01:31 --> 00:01:32 pick up speed.
00:01:32 --> 00:01:35 Anna: Right, but here's the lovely part. The news
00:01:35 --> 00:01:38 this week isn't the flyby itself. It's what
00:01:38 --> 00:01:40 came home afterwards. Over the last few
00:01:40 --> 00:01:42 weeks, the team has been downlinking and
00:01:42 --> 00:01:45 crunching the data and they've just released
00:01:45 --> 00:01:48 it along with a genuinely mesmerizing month.
00:01:48 --> 00:01:50 Long time lapse of Mars growing and then
00:01:50 --> 00:01:51 receding.
00:01:52 --> 00:01:54 Avery: Why bother running the instruments during a
00:01:54 --> 00:01:56 flyby, though? Mars has been studied to
00:01:56 --> 00:01:56 death.
00:01:57 --> 00:02:00 Anna: Two reasons. First, it's a dress rehearsal.
00:02:00 --> 00:02:02 Ours was a stand in for the asteroid. A
00:02:02 --> 00:02:04 chance to put Psyche science instruments
00:02:04 --> 00:02:07 through their paces under real deep space
00:02:07 --> 00:02:10 conditions before the main event. And second,
00:02:10 --> 00:02:13 after two and a half years in space, you
00:02:13 --> 00:02:15 want to know your gear still works.
00:02:15 --> 00:02:16 Avery: So how did it do?
00:02:17 --> 00:02:19 Anna: Really well. The star of the show was the
00:02:19 --> 00:02:22 Gamma Ray and Neutron Spectrometer. That's
00:02:22 --> 00:02:24 the instrument built with Johns Hopkins
00:02:24 --> 00:02:27 Applied Physics Laboratory with a gamma ray
00:02:27 --> 00:02:29 sensor from Lawrence Livermore. As they came
00:02:29 --> 00:02:32 in close to Mars, the neutron spectrometer
00:02:32 --> 00:02:34 picked up exactly the kind of signal boost
00:02:34 --> 00:02:35 they were hoping
00:02:35 --> 00:02:38 Avery: for the teen science lead David Lawrence
00:02:38 --> 00:02:40 put it nicely. He said around closest
00:02:40 --> 00:02:43 approach, the detector caught a count rate
00:02:43 --> 00:02:45 bump and that it was, quote, very gratifying
00:02:45 --> 00:02:46 to see.
00:02:46 --> 00:02:49 Anna: They were actually too far out about
00:02:49 --> 00:02:52 4km to catch
00:02:52 --> 00:02:54 Gamma rays coming off Mars itself. But that
00:02:54 --> 00:02:57 was fine. The point was to prove the
00:02:57 --> 00:02:59 instrument performs. And it did. The
00:02:59 --> 00:03:01 magnetometer and the imager delivered too.
00:03:02 --> 00:03:04 Avery: And all this matters because of what Psyche
00:03:04 --> 00:03:07 16 actually is exactly.
00:03:07 --> 00:03:10 Anna: Most asteroids are rock or ice.
00:03:10 --> 00:03:13 Psyche looks like it might be mostly metal,
00:03:13 --> 00:03:15 iron, nickel and a, uh, scattering of other
00:03:15 --> 00:03:18 elements. The leading idea is that it's the
00:03:18 --> 00:03:20 exposed core of a baby planet.
00:03:21 --> 00:03:23 Planetesimal that got stripped of its outer
00:03:23 --> 00:03:26 rocky layers in the chaos of the early solar
00:03:26 --> 00:03:26 system.
00:03:26 --> 00:03:29 Avery: Which means it's the closest we may ever get
00:03:29 --> 00:03:31 to standing on a planetary core.
00:03:32 --> 00:03:34 Anna: We can't drill down to Earth's core. The
00:03:34 --> 00:03:37 pressure and heat make that impossible. But
00:03:37 --> 00:03:39 we might be able to visit one that's sitting
00:03:39 --> 00:03:42 out in the open. That gamma ray and neutron
00:03:42 --> 00:03:44 spectrometer is the tool that'll read its
00:03:44 --> 00:03:46 chemistry when we arrive. Iron,
00:03:46 --> 00:03:49 nickel, silicon, sulfur,
00:03:49 --> 00:03:52 and tell us what a planetary core is really
00:03:52 --> 00:03:52 made of.
00:03:53 --> 00:03:55 Avery: So the Mars flyby was the warmup and the band
00:03:55 --> 00:03:58 is tuned. 2029 suddenly feels
00:03:58 --> 00:03:59 closer.
00:03:59 --> 00:04:02 Anna: It does. And if you get a chance, do look up
00:04:02 --> 00:04:04 that time lapse. It's a beautiful reminder
00:04:04 --> 00:04:07 that even a routine gravity assist can be
00:04:07 --> 00:04:08 pure poetry.
00:04:08 --> 00:04:11 Avery: From a mission on its way out, uh, to one
00:04:11 --> 00:04:13 getting ready to leave, Europe's next great
00:04:13 --> 00:04:16 planet hunter, ESA's Plato has
00:04:16 --> 00:04:19 just passed its last big test before launch.
00:04:20 --> 00:04:22 Anna: Plato remind everyone what it's built to do.
00:04:23 --> 00:04:25 Avery: It's a, uh, planet detective with 26
00:04:25 --> 00:04:28 cameras working together. And its mission is
00:04:28 --> 00:04:30 a specific to find Earth. Like
00:04:31 --> 00:04:33 rocky planets orbiting in the habitable zone
00:04:33 --> 00:04:36 of sun like stars. Not just any planets.
00:04:37 --> 00:04:39 Worlds where you could plausibly imagine
00:04:39 --> 00:04:40 liquid water on the surface.
00:04:41 --> 00:04:43 Anna: 26 cameras is a lot of eyes.
00:04:43 --> 00:04:44 What was the test?
00:04:45 --> 00:04:48 Avery: It's called electromagnetic compatibility
00:04:48 --> 00:04:50 testing. Engineers sealed the whole
00:04:50 --> 00:04:53 spacecraft inside a chamber at ESA's
00:04:53 --> 00:04:55 technical center in the Netherlands, a room
00:04:55 --> 00:04:57 called the Maxwell chamber, which is
00:04:57 --> 00:05:00 essentially a 9 meter tall Faraday cage
00:05:00 --> 00:05:03 lined with foam spikes to soak up every stray
00:05:03 --> 00:05:06 radio signal. It mimics the electromagnetic
00:05:06 --> 00:05:07 silence of deep space.
00:05:09 --> 00:05:11 Then they switched everything on at once.
00:05:12 --> 00:05:15 All 26 cameras, all the subsystems
00:05:15 --> 00:05:17 humming together to make sure none of them
00:05:17 --> 00:05:19 interfere with each other or with the radios.
00:05:19 --> 00:05:22 No cross talk, no chatter, no one
00:05:22 --> 00:05:24 instrument drowning out another.
00:05:24 --> 00:05:27 Anna: Because up in orbit, if your own electronics
00:05:27 --> 00:05:29 are shouting over each other, you've got a
00:05:29 --> 00:05:32 very expensive problem you can't fix.
00:05:32 --> 00:05:35 Avery: Precisely. And Plato passed. This was the
00:05:35 --> 00:05:38 last major qualification hurdle. Earlier this
00:05:38 --> 00:05:40 year, it survived the violent shaking and
00:05:40 --> 00:05:43 noise of launch simulations and the long
00:05:43 --> 00:05:45 stint in a giant vacuum chamber to prove it
00:05:45 --> 00:05:47 can take the cold and the emptiness of space.
00:05:48 --> 00:05:49 Anna: So what's next for it?
00:05:50 --> 00:05:53 Avery: It's on track to fly on an Ariane 6 rocket.
00:05:53 --> 00:05:55 The current target is 2027. Heading out
00:05:55 --> 00:05:58 to the Sun, Earth, L2 point, that
00:05:58 --> 00:06:01 gravitational parking spot about 1.5 million
00:06:01 --> 00:06:03 kilometers beyond Earth, where the James Webb
00:06:03 --> 00:06:04 Telescope also lives.
00:06:05 --> 00:06:08 Anna: And once it's there, it'll stare at hundreds
00:06:08 --> 00:06:10 of thousands of stars, waiting for the tiny
00:06:10 --> 00:06:13 regular dips that betray a planet crossing in
00:06:13 --> 00:06:14 front.
00:06:14 --> 00:06:17 Avery: That's a dream. If Plato finds a genuine
00:06:17 --> 00:06:20 Earth twin around the genuine sun twin,
00:06:20 --> 00:06:22 that's a headline we'll all remember. For
00:06:22 --> 00:06:24 now, the electronics are ready and the ride
00:06:24 --> 00:06:25 is booked.
00:06:26 --> 00:06:28 Anna: Now, a lot of this week's science is pouring
00:06:28 --> 00:06:31 out of one place. The Royal Astronomical
00:06:31 --> 00:06:34 Society's National Astronomy meeting, which
00:06:34 --> 00:06:36 kicked off in Birmingham yesterday and runs
00:06:36 --> 00:06:39 all week. And one of the first results is a
00:06:39 --> 00:06:40 little satellite with a big job.
00:06:41 --> 00:06:43 Avery: This is the space weather. One which feels
00:06:43 --> 00:06:46 timely given how much we talked about solar
00:06:46 --> 00:06:46 storms on Saturday.
00:06:47 --> 00:06:50 Anna: It does. But this is the other side of that
00:06:50 --> 00:06:53 coin. On Saturday, we talked about how bad
00:06:53 --> 00:06:55 a big solar storm could get. This is about
00:06:55 --> 00:06:58 how much warning we'd have when one's coming.
00:06:58 --> 00:07:01 And right now, the honest answer is not
00:07:01 --> 00:07:01 much.
00:07:02 --> 00:07:03 Avery: How much are we talking?
00:07:03 --> 00:07:06 Anna: For the fastest storms, the really dangerous
00:07:06 --> 00:07:09 coronal mass ejections, we get roughly
00:07:09 --> 00:07:12 15 minutes. That's because our early
00:07:12 --> 00:07:14 warning satellites sit at a point called
00:07:14 --> 00:07:17 L1, about 1.5 million
00:07:17 --> 00:07:20 km sunward of Earth. It passes
00:07:20 --> 00:07:23 them, they call ahead, and 15 minutes later
00:07:23 --> 00:07:23 it hits us.
00:07:24 --> 00:07:27 Avery: 15 minutes to protect satellites and power
00:07:27 --> 00:07:28 grids is not a lot.
00:07:28 --> 00:07:31 Anna: It's barely enough to send an email. So
00:07:31 --> 00:07:33 here's the idea presented at the meeting.
00:07:33 --> 00:07:36 It's a mission called Hanon. It's a
00:07:36 --> 00:07:39 cubesat think shoebox sized, but it
00:07:39 --> 00:07:41 would fly out to about 15 million
00:07:41 --> 00:07:44 kilometers upstream of Earth, 10
00:07:44 --> 00:07:45 times farther than L1.
00:07:46 --> 00:07:49 Avery: Ten times farther out means you see the storm
00:07:49 --> 00:07:50 10 times sooner.
00:07:50 --> 00:07:52 Anna: That's the whole pitch. It could stretch our
00:07:52 --> 00:07:55 warning from around 15 minutes to two or
00:07:55 --> 00:07:58 three hours. And it carries a UK built
00:07:58 --> 00:08:00 magnetometer called Magic, developed at
00:08:00 --> 00:08:03 Imperial College London to measure the
00:08:03 --> 00:08:05 magnetic field carried in the solar wind
00:08:05 --> 00:08:08 alongside instruments from teams in the Czech
00:08:08 --> 00:08:09 Republic and Finland.
00:08:09 --> 00:08:12 Avery: Hours instead of minutes. That changes what
00:08:12 --> 00:08:14 grid operators and satellite controllers can
00:08:14 --> 00:08:17 actually do. Power down safe
00:08:17 --> 00:08:18 mode Reposition.
00:08:19 --> 00:08:21 Anna: Exactly. And Henon is a proving ground,
00:08:21 --> 00:08:24 a technology demonstrator that paves the way
00:08:24 --> 00:08:27 for a bigger permanent European early warning
00:08:27 --> 00:08:29 mission down the line. It's a small box
00:08:29 --> 00:08:32 aiming to give the whole planet a head start.
00:08:32 --> 00:08:34 Avery: Staying with the sun and staying at the
00:08:34 --> 00:08:37 national astronomy meeting. Here's a clever
00:08:37 --> 00:08:39 piece of detective work. It's about
00:08:39 --> 00:08:41 predicting how fierce the next Sun's active
00:08:41 --> 00:08:44 period will be by studying how it goes quiet.
00:08:45 --> 00:08:48 Anna: This is the solar cycle, the roughly 11 year
00:08:48 --> 00:08:50 rhythm where the sun ramps up to a stormy
00:08:50 --> 00:08:53 maximum, then winds down to a sleepy
00:08:53 --> 00:08:54 minimum.
00:08:54 --> 00:08:57 Avery: Right. And forecasting the strength of the
00:08:57 --> 00:09:00 next maximum. How many sunspots, how many
00:09:00 --> 00:09:02 storms has always been notoriously hard.
00:09:03 --> 00:09:05 But a researcher presenting at the meeting
00:09:05 --> 00:09:07 has found a promising clue hiding in the wind
00:09:07 --> 00:09:08 down phase.
00:09:09 --> 00:09:11 Anna: So the secret to the next cycle is written
00:09:11 --> 00:09:14 into how the current one switches off.
00:09:14 --> 00:09:17 Avery: That's the argument. She looked at the Sun's
00:09:17 --> 00:09:19 declining phase and found the precursor, a
00:09:19 --> 00:09:22 signature that seems to foreshadow the size
00:09:22 --> 00:09:24 of the next maximum. And along the way,
00:09:24 --> 00:09:26 there was a neat bit of physics about what
00:09:26 --> 00:09:29 kind of storms we get as the sun quietens
00:09:29 --> 00:09:29 down.
00:09:29 --> 00:09:30 Anna: Go on.
00:09:30 --> 00:09:33 Avery: After the sun switches off from its active
00:09:33 --> 00:09:36 phase, the storms we still get become less
00:09:36 --> 00:09:39 extreme and they start marching to a 27
00:09:39 --> 00:09:39 day beat.
00:09:40 --> 00:09:43 Anna: 27 days. That's roughly one rotation
00:09:43 --> 00:09:44 of the Sun.
00:09:44 --> 00:09:47 Avery: Exactly. And that rhythm is the fingerprint
00:09:47 --> 00:09:50 of a different kind of space weather. Instead
00:09:50 --> 00:09:52 of explosive coronal mass ejections firing
00:09:52 --> 00:09:55 off at random, these calmer storms are driven
00:09:55 --> 00:09:58 by long lived streams of fast solar wind
00:09:58 --> 00:10:01 that sweep past us once per rotation, like
00:10:01 --> 00:10:03 a Lycos beam coming around.
00:10:03 --> 00:10:06 Anna: So it's not just a forecasting trick. It
00:10:06 --> 00:10:08 tells you which mechanism is doing the
00:10:08 --> 00:10:10 driving at different points in the cycle.
00:10:11 --> 00:10:13 Avery: That's what makes it useful. If you can read
00:10:13 --> 00:10:15 the declining phase properly, you get a
00:10:15 --> 00:10:18 running start on predicting the next maximum
00:10:18 --> 00:10:20 and better. Long range space weather
00:10:20 --> 00:10:22 forecasting helps everyone from airlines to
00:10:22 --> 00:10:23 satellite operators.
00:10:24 --> 00:10:26 Anna: Two sun stories in a row. But I love that
00:10:26 --> 00:10:28 they're opposite ends of the same problem.
00:10:29 --> 00:10:31 One's the warning system, one's the long
00:10:31 --> 00:10:32 range forecast.
00:10:32 --> 00:10:35 Let's change the scenery completely from the
00:10:35 --> 00:10:37 sun to some Ceres hardware. Back on the
00:10:37 --> 00:10:40 ground in the United States, three big
00:10:40 --> 00:10:42 players are teaming up to start building the
00:10:42 --> 00:10:44 future of radio astronomy.
00:10:44 --> 00:10:47 Avery: The National Science foundation, the National
00:10:47 --> 00:10:49 Radio Astronomy Observatory,
00:10:50 --> 00:10:52 and this is the interesting1, the U.S.
00:10:53 --> 00:10:54 naval Observatory.
00:10:54 --> 00:10:56 Anna: That last one raises an eyebrow. What's the
00:10:56 --> 00:10:58 Navy doing in radio astronomy?
00:10:59 --> 00:11:01 Avery: Well, more than you'd think. We'll come back
00:11:01 --> 00:11:03 to that. The Headline is they're funding a
00:11:03 --> 00:11:06 Pathfinder, a first installment of something
00:11:06 --> 00:11:09 called the next generation Very Large Array,
00:11:09 --> 00:11:11 the ngvla.
00:11:11 --> 00:11:14 Anna: And listeners will know the original Very
00:11:14 --> 00:11:15 Large Array, even if they don't know the
00:11:15 --> 00:11:18 name. That field of huge white dishes in the
00:11:18 --> 00:11:21 New Mexico desert. It's the telescope from
00:11:21 --> 00:11:23 the film Contact with Jody Foster sitting on
00:11:23 --> 00:11:26 the bonnet of her car, headphones on,
00:11:26 --> 00:11:27 listening to the sky.
00:11:28 --> 00:11:30 Avery: The very one. It's been working for over
00:11:30 --> 00:11:33 45 years. The NG VLA is
00:11:33 --> 00:11:36 its heir. And it's enormous by comparison.
00:11:36 --> 00:11:39 The full vision is 266
00:11:39 --> 00:11:41 antennas with the core in New Mexico. But
00:11:41 --> 00:11:43 this is spread right across the American
00:11:44 --> 00:11:46 Southwest and beyond, roughly 10
00:11:46 --> 00:11:48 times m more sensitive than today's array.
00:11:49 --> 00:11:51 Anna: So what does this pathfinder actually do?
00:11:52 --> 00:11:54 Avery: It focuses on a technique called very Long
00:11:54 --> 00:11:56 Baseline interferometry.
00:11:58 --> 00:12:00 The idea is you link antennas that are
00:12:00 --> 00:12:02 enormously far apart and combine their
00:12:02 --> 00:12:05 signals so together they act like one
00:12:05 --> 00:12:07 telescope, as wide as the whole continent.
00:12:08 --> 00:12:10 That gives you staggeringly sharp images.
00:12:10 --> 00:12:12 Anna: And that's where the Navy comes in.
00:12:13 --> 00:12:15 Avery: That's where the Navy comes in. Those ultra
00:12:15 --> 00:12:18 precise measurements also underpin the
00:12:18 --> 00:12:21 celestial reference frame, the master grid of
00:12:21 --> 00:12:23 fixed points in the sky that we use to know
00:12:23 --> 00:12:26 exactly where we are and which way we're
00:12:26 --> 00:12:28 pointing. It's astronomy and navigation
00:12:28 --> 00:12:29 hand in hand.
00:12:30 --> 00:12:33 Anna: So one instrument helps map black holes
00:12:33 --> 00:12:35 and helps keep the world's clocks and
00:12:35 --> 00:12:36 coordinates honest.
00:12:37 --> 00:12:39 Avery: Beautifully put. Construction and early
00:12:39 --> 00:12:41 operations are expected before the end of the
00:12:41 --> 00:12:44 decade. It's the quiet, unglamorous
00:12:44 --> 00:12:47 groundwork that great discoveries are built
00:12:47 --> 00:12:47 on.
00:12:47 --> 00:12:50 Anna: And that brings us to Skywatch. And
00:12:50 --> 00:12:52 tonight, finally, the southern sky gets the
00:12:52 --> 00:12:53 good seats.
00:12:54 --> 00:12:56 Avery: This is our shower, isn't it? The southern
00:12:56 --> 00:12:57 Delta Aquariids.
00:12:57 --> 00:13:00 Anna: It really is. So many of the famous
00:13:00 --> 00:13:03 meteor showers favor the northern hemisphere,
00:13:03 --> 00:13:05 but the Delta Aquariids are the exception.
00:13:06 --> 00:13:08 Their radiant, the point they appear to
00:13:08 --> 00:13:11 stream from, sits near a star called Skat in
00:13:11 --> 00:13:14 Aquarius. And from Sydney or across New
00:13:14 --> 00:13:16 Zealand, that's high overhead. We get the
00:13:16 --> 00:13:17 front row view.
00:13:18 --> 00:13:18 Avery: When do they peak?
00:13:19 --> 00:13:22 Anna: Officially around the 29th and 30th of
00:13:22 --> 00:13:25 July. But and this is the important
00:13:25 --> 00:13:28 bit, there's a catch. This year the peak
00:13:28 --> 00:13:30 lands right on a near full buck moon.
00:13:30 --> 00:13:32 And that much moonlight will wash out these
00:13:32 --> 00:13:35 meteors because they tend to be faint.
00:13:35 --> 00:13:37 Avery: So the peak date, uh, is actually the wrong
00:13:37 --> 00:13:39 night to go out for once.
00:13:39 --> 00:13:42 Anna: Yes, the smart move is to go out this week
00:13:42 --> 00:13:45 instead. Right now, the moon is still waxing
00:13:45 --> 00:13:48 and sets before dawn, which leaves the sky
00:13:48 --> 00:13:50 nice and dark in those early morning hours.
00:13:51 --> 00:13:53 And this shower is generous. It rambles along
00:13:53 --> 00:13:56 for days rather than spiking on one night.
00:13:57 --> 00:13:59 So the moon free mornings this week are your
00:13:59 --> 00:14:00 best window.
00:14:00 --> 00:14:02 Avery: What are we actually looking for?
00:14:02 --> 00:14:05 Anna: Under a proper dark sky, maybe 15
00:14:05 --> 00:14:08 to 20 meters an hour. They're on the faint
00:14:08 --> 00:14:11 side, long and graceful rather than
00:14:11 --> 00:14:13 flashy. And a nice fraction of them leave a
00:14:13 --> 00:14:16 glowing trail that lingers for a second or
00:14:16 --> 00:14:18 two after they've gone. The suspected parent,
00:14:18 --> 00:14:20 by the way, is a comet called
00:14:20 --> 00:14:22 96PMachholz.
00:14:23 --> 00:14:24 Avery: Any tips for getting the most out of it?
00:14:25 --> 00:14:28 Anna: Get away from town lights if you can wrap up
00:14:28 --> 00:14:30 warm. It is winter down here. And give your
00:14:30 --> 00:14:33 eyes a good half hour to adapt. Buy
00:14:33 --> 00:14:36 back, take in as much sky as you can rather
00:14:36 --> 00:14:38 than staring at one spot. And be patient.
00:14:39 --> 00:14:41 And a bonus, toward the very end of the
00:14:41 --> 00:14:43 month, a second shower. The Alpha
00:14:43 --> 00:14:46 Capricornids joins in with slow, bright
00:14:46 --> 00:14:49 fireballs. So keep watching into early
00:14:49 --> 00:14:50 August, faint
00:14:50 --> 00:14:53 Avery: and graceful with the odd fireball for drama.
00:14:53 --> 00:14:55 That's a lovely winter's night under the
00:14:55 --> 00:14:56 stars.
00:14:56 --> 00:14:56 Anna: It is.
00:14:57 --> 00:14:58 Rug up. Look up.
00:14:58 --> 00:15:01 Avery: Before we go, a quick one to chew on. We
00:15:01 --> 00:15:03 mentioned Psyche is heading for a metal
00:15:03 --> 00:15:06 asteroid. Here's the teaser. If you could
00:15:06 --> 00:15:09 somehow bring that metal to market. Its value
00:15:09 --> 00:15:11 has been estimated at a number so large
00:15:11 --> 00:15:14 it's essentially meaningless. More than the
00:15:14 --> 00:15:17 entire world economy. We'll leave the exact
00:15:17 --> 00:15:18 figure for the trivia cards.
00:15:19 --> 00:15:21 Anna: A quintillion dollar rock. File that one
00:15:21 --> 00:15:22 away.
00:15:22 --> 00:15:25 Avery: So today, Psyche sent home its Mars
00:15:25 --> 00:15:27 flyby data. And the gorgeous time lapse
00:15:27 --> 00:15:30 Plato passed its final test on the road to
00:15:30 --> 00:15:33 launch. A shoebox satellite called Hainan
00:15:33 --> 00:15:36 could turn 15 minutes of storm warning into
00:15:36 --> 00:15:37 three hours.
00:15:37 --> 00:15:40 Anna: The sun's quiet spell may help us forecast
00:15:40 --> 00:15:43 its next loud one. The first pieces of the
00:15:43 --> 00:15:45 mighty NGVLA are being funded.
00:15:45 --> 00:15:48 And the Delta Aquarids are lighting up our,
00:15:48 --> 00:15:49 uh, Southern skies this week.
00:15:50 --> 00:15:52 Avery: That's a full show. Everything we covered is
00:15:52 --> 00:15:55 linked in the show notes at astronomydaily
00:15:55 --> 00:15:58 IO and you can find us on all the
00:15:58 --> 00:16:00 socials astrodaily Pod.
00:16:00 --> 00:16:02 Anna: If today taught you something new, share it
00:16:02 --> 00:16:05 with a friend who looks up. I'm Anna.
00:16:05 --> 00:16:07 Avery: And I'm Avery. Thanks for spending part of
00:16:07 --> 00:16:08 your day with us.
00:16:08 --> 00:16:10 Anna: Until tomorrow, clear skies.