Latest / Made of Stars / Artemis II Wet Dress Rehearsal Part 2

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Artemis II Wet Dress Rehearsal Part 2 · Made of Stars

0:00
Speaker 1: Warning.
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Speaker 2: The following podcast contains an entertaining look at astronomy, physics,
0:04
Speaker 2: and space news throughout the known universe. Listeners have been
0:07
Speaker 2: known to learn about astronomical phenomenon, the scientific method, and
0:10
Speaker 2: expanded vocabulary to include terms like quasar asterism and uranus. Listen,
0:15
Speaker 2: that's your own risk.
0:16
Speaker 3: Go ahead. When made of stars, made them stars, madies, When.
0:29
Speaker 1: Maida stars.
0:33
Speaker 3: You could be from high they would New Mexicomus where all.
0:41
Speaker 4: Stars? When we are made of stars.
0:55
Speaker 1: I'm Wes Carol, joined by my good friend doctor Sean
0:58
Speaker 1: Cruisin from Columba State University's Cola Space Science Center.
1:01
Speaker 3: Hey Sean, good morning West could be here today.
1:04
Speaker 1: So I'm coming out of a crud. I feel a
1:07
Speaker 1: little better than I did a week ago when we
1:09
Speaker 1: were recording, so that's that's good. I think the voice
1:12
Speaker 1: at least is coming back in some capacity. So I'm
1:16
Speaker 1: gonna try not to do anything to laugh. And that's
1:18
Speaker 1: gonna be a challenge because you and I often are,
1:21
Speaker 1: you know, kind of especially me making you know, uranus
1:24
Speaker 1: jokes and stuff. But we're gonna get through this without.
1:27
Speaker 3: There's absolutely nothing funny on this show. Today business, I
1:31
Speaker 3: have serious business today unlike all our other shows.
1:34
Speaker 1: That's right. Don't expect us any otherwise. You're gonna hear
1:38
Speaker 1: me coughing a lot, and nobody wants to hear that.
1:40
Speaker 4: Believe me.
1:41
Speaker 1: I've got a house full of people that are tired
1:43
Speaker 1: of listening to each other cough. The dog is like,
1:46
Speaker 1: could you guys knock it off? I'm trying to sleep.
1:48
Speaker 1: That's what's going on in our house, all of us
1:51
Speaker 1: for like two weeks now. But anyway, very rough, all right.
1:55
Speaker 1: So currently, as we are recording on this Thursday, a
2:01
Speaker 1: nineteenth day of February in the Year of Our Lord
2:04
Speaker 1: twenty twenty six, NASA has Artemis to back in another
2:10
Speaker 1: wet dress rehearsal. It's going on now. Right before we
2:14
Speaker 1: hit the record button, you did a check just to
2:16
Speaker 1: kind of see what was going on in case we
2:19
Speaker 1: had any live breaking news, and basically our breaking news
2:25
Speaker 1: is yeah, they're just getting started kind of.
2:28
Speaker 3: I mean, since this is a podcast, you know, and
2:30
Speaker 3: people probably won't listen till just a bit later. The
2:34
Speaker 3: latest three we can tell you is that the rocket
2:35
Speaker 3: is still upright.
2:36
Speaker 1: That's that's a good thing. We wanted to know that
2:39
Speaker 1: at the very least, so that's some good stuff.
2:42
Speaker 3: One might call it erect. The rocket is erect. It
2:45
Speaker 3: is not prone, it is not in a state of explosion.
2:50
Speaker 3: I just checked the video. It's it is still erect.
2:52
Speaker 3: So we have a rocket on the launch pad. Now listen.
2:55
Speaker 3: It's been on the on the launch pad erect since January, right,
3:00
Speaker 3: And so this thing they rolled it out in January.
3:02
Speaker 3: They were trying to get this wet dress rehearsal done
3:05
Speaker 3: at the last part of January, so we might have
3:08
Speaker 3: had an early February launch that particular wet dress rehearsal
3:12
Speaker 3: where the plan was to load it up with all
3:15
Speaker 3: seven hundred thousand gallons of liquid hydrogen and liquid oxygen fuel.
3:20
Speaker 3: That one didn't go so well. It was pretty leaky,
3:23
Speaker 3: and you don't want a leaky rocket. It's bad to
3:26
Speaker 3: have leaky rockets. They're terrible.
3:28
Speaker 1: Yeah, that's not good at all.
3:30
Speaker 3: They do explodey things, so you don't want that. So
3:34
Speaker 3: they shut that test down. Now listen, they in all seriousness,
3:37
Speaker 3: there were some seals that were leaking this fuel, and
3:41
Speaker 3: liquid hydrogen always leaks, but it's the amount that was
3:44
Speaker 3: leaking out was just a bit too high, and so
3:47
Speaker 3: they shut that one down on February twelfth. Last week,
3:51
Speaker 3: they did a second kind of semi test. They did
3:55
Speaker 3: what's called a confidence test on Thursday, February twelve, where
4:00
Speaker 3: they put some fuel in it, so not all the fuel,
4:04
Speaker 3: they put some fuel in it just to see how
4:07
Speaker 3: the leaks were doing. And apparently because of that confidence test,
4:12
Speaker 3: they had enough confidence to go ahead and schedule this
4:15
Speaker 3: wet dress rehearsal. So, as Wes mentioned a minute ago,
4:17
Speaker 3: so right now as we speak at the Kennedy Space Center,
4:21
Speaker 3: NASA is conducting its second wet dress rehearsal on the
4:24
Speaker 3: Space Launch System rocket to carry Artemis two with its
4:29
Speaker 3: Orion capsule and astronauts and board to the Moon, well
4:33
Speaker 3: not to the surface of the Moon, around the back
4:35
Speaker 3: side of the Moon, to do a lap around the Moon.
4:37
Speaker 3: So all right, So what's happening is if this test
4:41
Speaker 3: is successful, that puts them in a position where they
4:46
Speaker 3: could possibly launch Artemis two and the Space Launch System
4:50
Speaker 3: during the first week of March. And that's, honestly, that's
4:54
Speaker 3: what we're all hoping for, right that's the goal. We
4:56
Speaker 3: want to see that thing launch. So now they're doing
5:00
Speaker 3: this test to assess the newly replaced seals and make
5:04
Speaker 3: sure everything's working. Can they get through all of the
5:07
Speaker 3: countdown launch procedures successfully, Are the ground teams in place,
5:11
Speaker 3: they are doing the right things, the close out crew,
5:14
Speaker 3: all those kinds of things. So if all of that
5:16
Speaker 3: comes to fruition and the test is successful, which we
5:19
Speaker 3: should know by no later than about eight thirty pm tonight,
5:24
Speaker 3: because that's the actual T minus zero of the full
5:28
Speaker 3: dress rehearsal. In other words, that's the point where they
5:30
Speaker 3: would push the big green button or whatever big red
5:33
Speaker 3: button to launch the thing. So if they make it
5:36
Speaker 3: to that point, that basically means they made through that
5:39
Speaker 3: they made it through the test successfully, and the vehicle
5:42
Speaker 3: is ready to go, and then we're going to be
5:44
Speaker 3: talking about very early launch opportunities in March, right, so
5:51
Speaker 3: the early part of March. If they fail, if something
5:55
Speaker 3: goes wrong, now you have the situation where that rocket's
5:58
Speaker 3: been sitting out there a lot, and they don't like
6:01
Speaker 3: to leave their rockets sitting out on the launch pad
6:03
Speaker 3: for extended period of times. For instance, back in the
6:07
Speaker 3: Space Shuttle days, things can happen like this. You actually
6:10
Speaker 3: had woodpeckers making homes in the insulating foam on the
6:14
Speaker 3: main fuel tank. So if you leave it out there
6:17
Speaker 3: long enough, you know, nature happens. Right, there's things.
6:20
Speaker 1: Yeah, that's not good at all.
6:23
Speaker 3: You don't want woodpeckers.
6:24
Speaker 1: No, no, no, no at all.
6:27
Speaker 3: It's bad case of the woodpeckers. Can't have that in rockets.
6:29
Speaker 3: So anyway, well, the point of that is they may
6:33
Speaker 3: end up rolling this rocket back, right, So if today's
6:36
Speaker 3: test doesn't go well, they may end up rolling this
6:39
Speaker 3: rocket back to the VAB, going through all the systems,
6:42
Speaker 3: resetting everything. And then if that happens, we may not
6:46
Speaker 3: have an accessible launch window until summertime.
6:50
Speaker 1: So again just mentioning the fact that this could happen.
6:54
Speaker 1: The launch could happen in early March, that's like two
6:58
Speaker 1: weeks away basically when that's opportunity could be there. So
7:03
Speaker 1: we feel again like we're back on the precipice of history.
7:06
Speaker 1: It's the possibility that this is coming. So yes, fingers
7:11
Speaker 1: crossed for a good successful wet dress rehearsal today and yeah,
7:17
Speaker 1: just checking now, yep, still upright. I just want to
7:20
Speaker 1: keep giving those updates. The last time you and I
7:22
Speaker 1: saw it in person, I guess was the last time
7:25
Speaker 1: that it was horizontal. You know, we were there for that.
7:27
Speaker 3: I mean it's been a minute since it was horizontal,
7:30
Speaker 3: it has been. Yeah, we had our former student here
7:34
Speaker 3: at co Cola Space Science Center, Zach Kocher is part
7:37
Speaker 3: of the team who was assembling the rocket down at
7:42
Speaker 3: the Vehicle Assembly Building back in October. And of course
7:45
Speaker 3: Zach was maybe sharing with as a photo or two,
7:47
Speaker 3: which he's put some of those on Facebook as well.
7:49
Speaker 3: So but anyway, so we knew that it was being
7:52
Speaker 3: stacked back in October. So yeah, prior to that, October's
7:55
Speaker 3: last time it was horizontal, and now it's been vertical
7:58
Speaker 3: for a bit, first in the VA and then out
8:01
Speaker 3: at the pad. It's got a bit too much pad time.
8:04
Speaker 3: They've got to go ahead and launch it. Woodpeckers and
8:06
Speaker 3: all or by the way, ways, I am not saying
8:10
Speaker 3: that there are woodpeckers on the VA B right now.
8:12
Speaker 3: Don't hear what I'm not saying. I'm just saying that
8:15
Speaker 3: was a problem in the past with the Space Shuttle program. Anyway,
8:18
Speaker 3: So they've got to decide whether in its current configuration
8:21
Speaker 3: it can both hold fuel and it's structurally sound to
8:24
Speaker 3: be able to launch astronauts to the moon.
8:27
Speaker 1: I hadn't really thought about this, And now that you're
8:29
Speaker 1: talking about the woodpeckers there on on the you know,
8:32
Speaker 1: on the rocket or working their way into it, and
8:36
Speaker 1: it never really occurred to me that we do have
8:40
Speaker 1: critters and things that will, you know, dig their way
8:43
Speaker 1: into things. And I just sit there and I think
8:46
Speaker 1: about if there was a woodpecker that's there, and we're
8:48
Speaker 1: not saying there is, but what if there is a
8:50
Speaker 1: woodpecker that's burrowed and hanging out, or there's some sort
8:54
Speaker 1: of a critter that's you know, made a home in
8:57
Speaker 1: one of those woodpecker holes, and then this thing launches.
9:00
Speaker 1: What are they thinking as they're headed to space? You
9:03
Speaker 1: know what's going through there? You know what's going in
9:06
Speaker 1: the mind of a carpenter bee that's making its first
9:09
Speaker 1: trip to space. That's what I'm wondering. I don't know,
9:13
Speaker 1: but you know, speaking of somebody that you know has
9:15
Speaker 1: a wooden deck, the carpenter bees can all go. I don't.
9:19
Speaker 1: I don't really have much use for them at all.
9:21
Speaker 1: Anybody that's got a privacy fence or a deck or anything,
9:25
Speaker 1: you know, they're not.
9:25
Speaker 3: I too have a wooden deck, and I too, wish
9:28
Speaker 3: the same evil fate on all carpenter bees. So I mean,
9:32
Speaker 3: I'm sure they're important for the ecosystem for some reason,
9:35
Speaker 3: but golly do they make a mess of my deck.
9:39
Speaker 3: And I wouldn't want a case of the carpenter bees
9:41
Speaker 3: in my insulating foam, on the giant solid brocket boosters,
9:45
Speaker 3: or on the main fuel tank of the SLS. I
9:47
Speaker 3: just wouldn't want any of that.
9:48
Speaker 1: I won't share it now, but I have some childhood
9:51
Speaker 1: trauma from carpenter bees, from a little fort that we
9:55
Speaker 1: built out of some old planks of wood, and they
9:57
Speaker 1: really scared me a lot. But I'm not going to
10:00
Speaker 1: go into too many details with that. Let's talk about
10:03
Speaker 1: insects that are great. I like fireflies. Let's talk about
10:07
Speaker 1: firefly aerospace, because fireflies.
10:09
Speaker 3: Are better I think for space maybe than carpenter bees.
10:12
Speaker 1: Maybe they would look amazing if they got launched to space,
10:15
Speaker 1: and if they had the ability to light up just.
10:19
Speaker 3: One I'm not belaboring the previous point too much, but
10:21
Speaker 3: I do. I am now curious about how many species
10:24
Speaker 3: involuntarily have gone to space because we just didn't know
10:28
Speaker 3: they had girled their way into insulating foam or whatever,
10:31
Speaker 3: and they went, I'm now curious.
10:34
Speaker 1: It would it would be an interesting It would be
10:38
Speaker 1: an interesting thing to know just how many things. I mean,
10:42
Speaker 1: we can't know the answer obviously, but it would be
10:44
Speaker 1: I don't know, maybe they do know of some maybe
10:46
Speaker 1: they've been like, oh, well, we we were suspicious, but
10:50
Speaker 1: then it never turned up again, so we assumed it
10:53
Speaker 1: burned up or whatever.
10:55
Speaker 3: Anyway, it's like everything else in life, we need to
10:57
Speaker 3: you know, we need an actuary to come help us
10:59
Speaker 3: with ustatistics of you know, a probability of how often
11:03
Speaker 3: this happened and something like that.
11:04
Speaker 1: Information that would be nice to learn. On the other side,
11:07
Speaker 1: you know, just someday a question to ask somebody who
11:11
Speaker 1: can give us the insight on what happened during all
11:14
Speaker 1: these launches. Well, speaking of launches, we've got the Alpha
11:18
Speaker 1: rocket from Firefly Aerospace getting ready to launch tomorrow potentially.
11:23
Speaker 3: You had a beautiful segue and I just exploded it
11:26
Speaker 3: with you know, nonsense about actuaries. But yes, okay, let's
11:28
Speaker 3: talk about Firefly because because you had a great segue
11:33
Speaker 3: and I just stepped on I had to.
11:35
Speaker 1: It's okay, but you guys, you gave me an opportunity
11:37
Speaker 1: to have two great segues.
11:40
Speaker 3: So after two great segues, we'll get to the story.
11:42
Speaker 3: So Firefly is a company. They're an aerospace company out
11:46
Speaker 3: of Texas near the Austin area, and they have already
11:51
Speaker 3: put a vehicle on the Moon back in twenty twenty five,
11:55
Speaker 3: Firefly's Blue Ghost mission I was named Ghostwriter in the Sky.
12:00
Speaker 3: That was the name of the mission. Yeah, okay, So
12:03
Speaker 3: it performed a fully successful commercial moon landing back on
12:08
Speaker 3: March second of twenty twenty five. All right, Well, so
12:11
Speaker 3: Firefly was following that up with a flight of of
12:17
Speaker 3: their Alpha rocket in April of twenty twenty five, when
12:21
Speaker 3: that didn't go well. They had a launch failure and
12:25
Speaker 3: they had to do a bunch of safety reviews and
12:27
Speaker 3: basically figure out what went wrong how to fix it.
12:30
Speaker 3: And they've been working on that for almost a year.
12:33
Speaker 3: But now tomorrow, as we record the show, we never
12:38
Speaker 3: know what's gonna happen in the future. But as we
12:40
Speaker 3: record the show, we're looking at tomorrow as a possible
12:43
Speaker 3: targeting for a test flight of the Firefly Alpha rocket
12:48
Speaker 3: from the Space Launch Complex Number two at Vandenburg Space
12:52
Speaker 3: Force Base in California. So that would be Friday, February twentieth,
12:57
Speaker 3: seven to twenty pm. That's when it's scheduled. Firefly is
13:01
Speaker 3: calling this there Stairway to seven mission. There's stair Is
13:07
Speaker 3: that some kind of puns that? I don't know what
13:09
Speaker 3: is that? Uh?
13:10
Speaker 1: Something like that? Yeah? I think so.
13:12
Speaker 3: Look the hipsterre reference to classic rock, I think something.
13:15
Speaker 3: All right, So Stairway to seven is it's because it's
13:17
Speaker 3: the seventh flight. You see, it's the seventh flight of
13:21
Speaker 3: the Alpha vehicle.
13:22
Speaker 4: Oh now, I.
13:23
Speaker 3: See, now makes perfect sense. Stairway to seven the seventh
13:26
Speaker 3: flight of the Alpha vehicle, and it's a return to
13:29
Speaker 3: flight following that failure from April twenty twenty five. So
13:33
Speaker 3: if this launch is successful, that will be a demonstration
13:38
Speaker 3: of this Alpha Rocket. However, they also think that this
13:41
Speaker 3: is probably gonna be the last launch of the Alpha
13:43
Speaker 3: Rocket because Firefly themselves are moving to one of their
13:47
Speaker 3: more recent and better launch platforms after this launch. So
13:51
Speaker 3: they're gonna go ahead with the Alpha Rocket launch, make
13:55
Speaker 3: it one more launch, but then that'll be it. The
13:58
Speaker 3: company plans to bring new launch capabilities to the mid
14:02
Speaker 3: Atlantic Regional Spaceport or MARS. That's an acronym for you
14:06
Speaker 3: who thought of that one. We used to call this
14:09
Speaker 3: Wallaps Island, but okay, it's the mid Atlantic Regional Spaceport
14:14
Speaker 3: in Virginia as early as twenty twenty six, so that's
14:17
Speaker 3: sometime this year. So anyway, we're looking for those things.
14:21
Speaker 3: And then also they're going to be following this up
14:25
Speaker 3: with international operations at somewhere called the Esrange Space Center
14:30
Speaker 3: in Sweden in twenty twenty seven. So Firefly really kind
14:34
Speaker 3: of expanding beyond their Alpha rocket. But we could see
14:38
Speaker 3: one or possibly two more launches of this vehicle, so it's.
14:43
Speaker 1: Not a stairway to heaven. But just a side note
14:47
Speaker 1: just to made me think about this, especially after you
14:49
Speaker 1: said Sweden speaking of songs kind of in that vein.
14:53
Speaker 1: When the US men's hockey team beat Sweden yesterday in
14:58
Speaker 1: the quarterfinal round, uh, they immediately played Freebird as they
15:02
Speaker 1: were celebrating on the ice. I just thought that was
15:04
Speaker 1: exciting to see. You know, it can't go wrong with that.
15:08
Speaker 1: That's just a nice job there by somebody.
15:12
Speaker 3: I just thought you were gonna tell me about a
15:13
Speaker 3: lady who's sure that all the glitters is gold and
15:16
Speaker 3: then tied to a gold medal or something that was coming,
15:19
Speaker 3: but you jumped a skinnard.
15:21
Speaker 1: You know, I just thought it was a nice touch.
15:24
Speaker 1: It was a really I don't wait a minute, they're
15:27
Speaker 1: playing free bird in Italy. I think this is fantastic.
15:31
Speaker 1: This is what we need in these Olympic Games.
15:35
Speaker 3: You know, there was a kind of a questionable part
15:38
Speaker 3: of my life where I played in rock bands and
15:40
Speaker 3: bars and I used to hear play some skinnerd I
15:42
Speaker 3: used to hear that quite a lot actually from the
15:45
Speaker 3: back of the bar.
15:46
Speaker 1: More made of stars right after this.
16:04
Speaker 4: All right, So we have been on.
16:12
Speaker 1: We have not been on Mars, but we have had
16:14
Speaker 1: vehicles on Mars. And part of what we've been doing
16:17
Speaker 1: on Mars is looking for signs of life on Mars.
16:21
Speaker 1: And one of the things that you look for when
16:24
Speaker 1: you're looking for signs of life is water in some capacity.
16:28
Speaker 1: We occasionally get these stories where well, oh, there's an
16:31
Speaker 1: indication of maybe some water or some ice or these
16:34
Speaker 1: things that you know they're looking for the key component
16:38
Speaker 1: to life, and water being that thing. When you find water,
16:42
Speaker 1: there's usually a pretty good at least possibility for life.
16:45
Speaker 1: You need it for life. And now we've got some
16:50
Speaker 1: more evidence about massive glaciers that may be hiding on Mars.
16:55
Speaker 3: Well, that would be interesting, wouldn't it. It would be
16:57
Speaker 3: like if you suddenly just found assive glaciers on Mars.
17:03
Speaker 3: How could this be possible?
17:04
Speaker 1: Well, and I say this about the life thing, it
17:07
Speaker 1: would also be pretty important for new life to be
17:11
Speaker 1: on Mars, as in us, to be there, you know,
17:14
Speaker 1: for any long term you know, period of existence, because
17:18
Speaker 1: if you decide you want to colonize Mars, it would
17:20
Speaker 1: be really convenient if there was some kind of water
17:23
Speaker 1: there that we would be able to tap into.
17:25
Speaker 3: I think this, I think this part's true. When when
17:27
Speaker 3: most people think about the potential for something like glaciers
17:32
Speaker 3: on Mars, you'd be going, well, wait a minute, are
17:34
Speaker 3: we are we talking about at the poles? Are we
17:37
Speaker 3: talking about up there where? You know, we actually can
17:39
Speaker 3: see ice on Mars from time to time at the
17:42
Speaker 3: North Pole and South Pole regions. Now, most of that ice,
17:45
Speaker 3: most of that ice is frozen CO two. It's dry ice.
17:48
Speaker 3: But there is definitely a water component to the polar
17:51
Speaker 3: caps on Mars. So one might think, well, okay, if
17:54
Speaker 3: scientists are possibly looking for or maybe even finding possible
17:59
Speaker 3: evidence of glaciers on Mars that might be up around
18:02
Speaker 3: the poles, but this new study is talking about giant
18:07
Speaker 3: glaciers that might be on Mars near the equator of Mars,
18:12
Speaker 3: which that makes it even more compelling because if it's
18:16
Speaker 3: near the equators on Mars, that's an easier place for
18:19
Speaker 3: us to potentially one day colonize, and as Wes just suggested,
18:24
Speaker 3: use some of that water that is potentially there in
18:27
Speaker 3: the form of these frozen glaciers for our advantage, or
18:32
Speaker 3: if we're not using it for our advantage for resources
18:34
Speaker 3: and things, at least look for the evidence of life
18:37
Speaker 3: within those glaciers at those locations, which I'm sure all
18:40
Speaker 3: that would be done, all right, So how does this
18:42
Speaker 3: play out? Well, here's how it plays out. Mars has
18:45
Speaker 3: some very large volcanoes. If that's a headline to you.
18:49
Speaker 3: You didn't know that before, then you haven't been paying
18:51
Speaker 3: attention to the evidence that we have of geological features
18:55
Speaker 3: on the planet Mars. So what's the new part? Is this?
18:59
Speaker 3: The new part is a group of scientists being led
19:02
Speaker 3: from the Alcala University in Madrid, Spain, have released some
19:07
Speaker 3: evidence of some features on the surface of the planet Mars.
19:12
Speaker 3: That look a lot like a certain island off the
19:16
Speaker 3: coast of Antarctica. Now, the island off the coast of
19:21
Speaker 3: Antarctica is called Deception Island. And one of the things
19:26
Speaker 3: that's deceptive about Deception Island near Antarctica is that you
19:32
Speaker 3: clearly see it's a giant volcano, But what you don't
19:37
Speaker 3: see is the volcanic ash and outflows from that volcano
19:41
Speaker 3: on that little island off the coast of Antarctica has
19:44
Speaker 3: covered up some big, massive glaciers. And so this island
19:48
Speaker 3: off the coast of Antarctica is a prototype for what
19:51
Speaker 3: it might look like if a volcano covered up a
19:55
Speaker 3: glacier and then basically preserved the properties of that glacier
20:01
Speaker 3: beneath a layer of ash and outflow from the volcano.
20:06
Speaker 3: So when these scientists from the University of Spain began
20:10
Speaker 3: to look at these certain features on the Martian surface,
20:14
Speaker 3: they realized that one of them, called Hecatus Tholus. Hecatas
20:21
Speaker 3: Tholus looks a lot like Deception Island in Antarctica. And
20:25
Speaker 3: I don't mean just like, oh, a casual resemblance. No,
20:28
Speaker 3: it's it's the very features that helped us to understand
20:32
Speaker 3: that Deception Island is really a volcano covering up glaciers.
20:36
Speaker 3: Those same kinds of geological features are repeating themselves on
20:40
Speaker 3: the surface of Mars. So a new study being published
20:44
Speaker 3: in the publication called Icarus, which is a journal in
20:47
Speaker 3: planetary science, by M. A. Depolo and co authors from
20:50
Speaker 3: Acala University in Madrid, Spain, have said, Hey, we think
20:55
Speaker 3: Hecatus Tholus near the Martian equator could be a location
21:02
Speaker 3: where volcanic ash has covered up deep glaciers from mars
21:08
Speaker 3: ancient past and preserve them to the present time. Which
21:13
Speaker 3: if that's true, it likely would not be the only
21:17
Speaker 3: location on Mars where that same thing has happened. And
21:21
Speaker 3: so then it opens up the possibility at least of
21:24
Speaker 3: abundant H two zero resources near the equator of the
21:29
Speaker 3: planet Mars, which would be ideal for the two things
21:33
Speaker 3: that West discussed, looking for a possibility of life in
21:36
Speaker 3: Mars past or even Mars present, and also if that
21:41
Speaker 3: didn't work out, exploiting that water for resources for Mars
21:45
Speaker 3: exploration and possibly colonization. So this is a really important
21:49
Speaker 3: topic and it's very interesting because because it's opened up
21:54
Speaker 3: a new venue for us to consider how we might
21:57
Speaker 3: access potential water resources on the service of Mars.
22:02
Speaker 1: So astronomers have picked up a signal from space seven
22:08
Speaker 1: hours long. My question is, did this signal come in
22:12
Speaker 1: before or after former President Obama went on a podcast
22:15
Speaker 1: and said aliens are real? What's the timing of this
22:21
Speaker 1: compared to that exchange that was had, because I feel
22:25
Speaker 1: like we could have led the show talking about that,
22:27
Speaker 1: but I thought, no, I know, we got this story
22:30
Speaker 1: coming up, and maybe there's a connection. I don't know,
22:33
Speaker 1: So which one do you want to start?
22:35
Speaker 3: With?
22:35
Speaker 1: The former president saying aliens are real and then backpedaling tremendously,
22:40
Speaker 1: maybe after a seven hour blast from planet Grebdar or
22:45
Speaker 1: whatever that came in and said whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa,
22:49
Speaker 1: And then he kind of said, let me be clear,
22:52
Speaker 1: I'm not saying anyway.
22:54
Speaker 3: That's pretty good. Thanks, that was decent.
22:57
Speaker 1: I've got, you know, I've got this ability to sound
22:59
Speaker 1: a little bit like most people. I'm not good enough
23:02
Speaker 1: for an SNL audition, but I can sound a little
23:04
Speaker 1: bit like people.
23:06
Speaker 3: We can at least invoke certain characters with just the
23:09
Speaker 3: sound of a possible yeah anyway, all right, So yeah,
23:14
Speaker 3: Sky at Night magazine. So unfortunately, the event, the seven
23:18
Speaker 3: hour event, was well before the President's podcast back in
23:22
Speaker 3: two thousand and twenty five.
23:24
Speaker 1: So that's what he was talking about. Is that what
23:25
Speaker 1: you're saying.
23:26
Speaker 3: I mean, I don't know you could be talking about that.
23:28
Speaker 3: So it's important for me to say I heard the
23:32
Speaker 3: President on this podcast say he knows that aliens are real.
23:36
Speaker 1: He knows it, he knows it.
23:39
Speaker 3: That's different than I'm pretty convinced that this big old
23:44
Speaker 3: universe has so many locations for life that it's a
23:47
Speaker 3: very high likelihood that life's No. That's different than somebody
23:52
Speaker 3: you used to have the nuclear codes going oh yeah,
23:53
Speaker 3: aliens are real, I know it. Yeah, those aren't the
23:59
Speaker 3: same thing.
23:59
Speaker 1: Those are the same thing at all.
24:02
Speaker 3: That's all. I'm good. That's all I'm gonna say about it.
24:06
Speaker 1: Was it was an interesting way to answer the question,
24:09
Speaker 1: to say, the very least.
24:10
Speaker 3: Whack medal is along the order of the kinds of
24:12
Speaker 3: things I say, which is like, well, you know, the
24:14
Speaker 3: universe has a lot of stars, and we are now
24:17
Speaker 3: realizing that most of those stars have planets of some
24:20
Speaker 3: sort around them. And then you know, so if you
24:22
Speaker 3: take it, you know you're in the trillions of trillions
24:24
Speaker 3: of planets out there. Then you know, there's a lot
24:27
Speaker 3: of rolls of the dice where you could have you see,
24:29
Speaker 3: do you hear all of the what I would call
24:33
Speaker 3: careful wording that I'm applying to this. That's different than
24:37
Speaker 3: me saying, oh, yeah, I know it. I know it
24:39
Speaker 3: because I had the nuclear codes, and I was in
24:44
Speaker 3: charge of the military and the CIA, and you know,
24:48
Speaker 3: the executive branch, and I know I know there's aliens.
24:51
Speaker 3: Oh wait, No, what I really meant was the universe
24:54
Speaker 3: is a big old place, and statistically.
24:56
Speaker 1: Speaking, all of those things, all I.
25:00
Speaker 3: Can say is those aren't the same thing.
25:02
Speaker 1: Yea, So we, because of the timing of this, we
25:05
Speaker 1: think these two stories are unrelated. Is that what you're saying.
25:08
Speaker 3: Spokespeople from Wells spokes aliens from Grebdar have not weighed
25:12
Speaker 3: in yet, so we're waiting for their response to the
25:18
Speaker 3: President's podcast. But they potentially did shoot a seven hour
25:23
Speaker 3: blast of gamma rays at the Earth. I don't know
25:24
Speaker 3: if that's intentional or just a phenomenon of nature. Hey,
25:30
Speaker 3: how about I dow this all back and get to
25:31
Speaker 3: the new story. The new story is this sky at
25:34
Speaker 3: night magazine reports that in twenty twenty five, astronomers detected
25:37
Speaker 3: a seven hour duration gamma ray burst from deep space.
25:45
Speaker 3: There they're now trying to sort through and go what
25:48
Speaker 3: was that, because see, gamma ray bursts are usually seconds
25:52
Speaker 3: to minutes, hence the term burst, right, it's like gamma
25:57
Speaker 3: ray burst. We've known about gamma ray bursts. Their very powerful,
26:00
Speaker 3: by the way, doses of gamma rays coming from various
26:05
Speaker 3: locations in deep space. We've known about those for a
26:08
Speaker 3: couple of decades. But now this latest one GRB, well
26:13
Speaker 3: it's the latest, this latest really different one GRB twenty
26:17
Speaker 3: five zero seven zero two B two five zero seven
26:22
Speaker 3: zero two b GRB two five zero seven zero two
26:25
Speaker 3: b bingo was was seven hours long, which is not
26:32
Speaker 3: a burst, that's a that's a blast and extended blast.
26:39
Speaker 3: And a scientists by the name of Eliza Knights, it
26:43
Speaker 3: was a researcher at NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center, was
26:47
Speaker 3: interviewed by Sky at Night magazine, one of our famous
26:50
Speaker 3: one of our favorite British publications on a strong Man astrophysics.
26:53
Speaker 3: We like like that publication and what Eliza told Sky
26:57
Speaker 3: at Night was well, this was a different kind of process,
27:01
Speaker 3: which we agree. So most gamma ray burst events originate
27:05
Speaker 3: from one of two possible processes. The leading thought is
27:09
Speaker 3: that they're coming from one of two things. The first
27:11
Speaker 3: is a collapse of a rapidly rotating massive star. That's
27:15
Speaker 3: the kind of thing that's leading to a supernova, okay,
27:18
Speaker 3: that can produce a burst of Gama rays. Or the
27:21
Speaker 3: merger of two neutron stars. Two neutron stars orbiting around
27:25
Speaker 3: one another, they finally infall they collide and that can
27:29
Speaker 3: for a very short period of time, emit a significant
27:32
Speaker 3: amount of gamma rays. But both of those are sort
27:35
Speaker 3: of minutes seconds to minutes in duration, not seven hours.
27:44
Speaker 3: So it would have to be an entirely new process
27:48
Speaker 3: unknown to scientists at this time that could create such
27:52
Speaker 3: a long term gamma ray not burst, but shower almost
27:58
Speaker 3: a beam of seven hour beam of gamma rays. So
28:02
Speaker 3: Eliza Knights and other researchers have suggested a possible cause. Now,
28:07
Speaker 3: after they've been thinking about this event that they measured
28:09
Speaker 3: back in twenty twenty five, they're coming out and saying, hey,
28:12
Speaker 3: this could be the merger of a black hole with
28:15
Speaker 3: something called a helium star. Or in other words, they
28:20
Speaker 3: short it to a helium merger. And what that means
28:23
Speaker 3: is a helium star is a dying star. Black hole
28:27
Speaker 3: is an already dead star. But a helium star is
28:29
Speaker 3: a dying star that has let go of most of
28:33
Speaker 3: its outer layers of hydrogen and its core is exposed,
28:38
Speaker 3: and that core has already been converted from hydrogen to helium,
28:41
Speaker 3: so it's a mostly helium object. And that dying star
28:46
Speaker 3: in falling to the black hole could possibly emit X
28:50
Speaker 3: rays over an extended period of time, therefore producing what
28:54
Speaker 3: was imaged in twenty twenty five and an extended seven
28:58
Speaker 3: hour bursts of gamma rays. So why does it make
29:01
Speaker 3: sense that a black hole and a helium star would
29:04
Speaker 3: be in a binary pair. Well, because those stars were
29:07
Speaker 3: maybe about the same age and maybe about the same size,
29:11
Speaker 3: and so as they aged out together, which would have
29:14
Speaker 3: happened rapidly for massive stars, but they aged out at
29:17
Speaker 3: about the same time. So you have a black hole
29:19
Speaker 3: which is already dead star next to an almost dead star.
29:24
Speaker 3: That would make sense from a chronological perspective, at least
29:26
Speaker 3: if they were born about the same period of time.
29:28
Speaker 3: So this is an interesting event. It's a new model
29:33
Speaker 3: for how massive doses of gamma rays can be released
29:36
Speaker 3: in the universe, and obviously we're going to need to
29:38
Speaker 3: be following up and looking for more gamma ray bursts
29:41
Speaker 3: and trying to measure another really long one like this
29:44
Speaker 3: to see if this alternative process is correct. But now
29:48
Speaker 3: we have another possible explanation for the large emission of
29:51
Speaker 3: gamma rays from the depths of space.
29:54
Speaker 1: More made of stars. Right after this, we are now
30:17
Speaker 1: a couple of weeks away from a possible launch by
30:22
Speaker 1: Artemis two. We're also now like less than two weeks
30:25
Speaker 1: away from the next Music under the Dome happening at
30:28
Speaker 1: Columbus State University's Coca Cola Space Science Center.
30:31
Speaker 3: It could be happening on the same day.
30:33
Speaker 1: That would be fantastic.
30:34
Speaker 3: Would you're just crazy with launching rockets and having concerts
30:39
Speaker 3: under a planetarium dome on the same day, that'd be great. Hey, friends,
30:42
Speaker 3: if you have not been down to the Coca Cola
30:44
Speaker 3: Space Science Center for one of the music and of
30:46
Speaker 3: the Dome concerts, it would be really great if you
30:48
Speaker 3: finally came. What have you been waiting for? So here's
30:52
Speaker 3: the setup. It's the fantastic musicians from our Columbus State
30:56
Speaker 3: University schwob School of Music. Both faculty and students dicians
31:00
Speaker 3: and singers who perform in music under the dome. They
31:03
Speaker 3: come into the planetarium, they have a concert list, we
31:07
Speaker 3: hire a space artist. The space artist creates original graphics
31:11
Speaker 3: that are choreographed to that music, and then the graphics
31:14
Speaker 3: are shown on the dome while the performers perform on
31:18
Speaker 3: the stage. It is a fantastic experience. It's kind of
31:21
Speaker 3: a one of a kind concert because you're not going
31:23
Speaker 3: to see the repeat of it. Even if you see
31:25
Speaker 3: a different music under the dome concert, they're never the same.
31:28
Speaker 3: It's never the same concert twice. So if you haven't
31:31
Speaker 3: joined us, please make your way down to Columbus, Georgia,
31:33
Speaker 3: come down and see a music under the dome under
31:36
Speaker 3: the Atmosphere Theater Planetarium in the Columbus State University Coca
31:40
Speaker 3: Cola Space Science Center. Find out more information about that
31:43
Speaker 3: on the website www dot cc SSEC dot org. Now,
31:47
Speaker 3: wait before we go, there's one other thing that could
31:49
Speaker 3: also potentially happen on March third. That's you seeing a
31:54
Speaker 3: lunar eclipse. So the lunar eclipse is going to happen
31:58
Speaker 3: in the morning of March third, which means one thing.
32:01
Speaker 3: It means it's a really long day for me. But
32:03
Speaker 3: it's going to be all right because we're gonna be
32:05
Speaker 3: out there at about four thirty am on the parking
32:07
Speaker 3: deck of Columbus State University, the main parking deck, up
32:11
Speaker 3: on the top floor. We're gonna have our telescope set
32:14
Speaker 3: up and we're gonna be pointing them at the moon,
32:16
Speaker 3: provided that the sky is clear weather permitting, as is
32:20
Speaker 3: the case with all these events, but we're hoping the
32:22
Speaker 3: sky is going to give us a clearing. We're going
32:24
Speaker 3: to point our telescopes at the lunar eclipse, which is
32:27
Speaker 3: happening as the moon is setting down over our western horizon,
32:31
Speaker 3: which is why we have to be up on a
32:33
Speaker 3: parking deck to be able to show it to you.
32:34
Speaker 3: But that's that's what we're going to do. We're going
32:37
Speaker 3: to have that lunary eclipse with telescopes on site. Right
32:41
Speaker 3: So come and join us at the top deck of
32:44
Speaker 3: the Columbus State University parking garage on March the third,
32:48
Speaker 3: and we will be pointing our telescopes at that lunary eclipse.
32:51
Speaker 3: Then later that night come back and join us for
32:53
Speaker 3: music under the dome in the Atmosphere Theater Planetarium right
32:56
Speaker 3: here at Columbus State University's Coca Cola Space Science And
33:00
Speaker 3: wouldn't it be cool if Artemis two also launched that day?
33:03
Speaker 3: Maybe we'll see what happens with the wet test?
33:06
Speaker 1: Dare we wish for the trifecta? Sean Seana, I thank
33:10
Speaker 1: you for listening, and we will do this again next week.
33:19
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