Latest / Space News Today / From Rocket Ruins to Cosmic Discoveries: Blue Origin’s Resilience and New Magnetic Insights

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From Rocket Ruins to Cosmic Discoveries: Blue Origin’s Resilience and New Magnetic Insights · Space News Today

0:00
Last week, a rocket exploded on its
0:02
launch pad in Cape Canaveral. The
0:04
fireball could be seen from miles. This
0:07
week, the CEO of Blue Origin looked at
0:09
the wreckage and said five words, "We
0:12
will fly again this year." That story,
0:15
plus magnetic fields discovered on
0:17
distant worlds, a space telescope
0:20
moments from launch, and the definitive
0:22
answer to one of astronomy's oldest
0:25
questions. This is Astronomy Daily.
0:28
Hello and welcome to Astronomy Daily,
0:31
your daily guide to the universe and
0:32
everything in it. I'm Avery.
0:34
>> And I'm Anna. It is Wednesday, the 4th
0:37
of June, 2026. And we have an
0:40
exceptional episode lined up today.
0:42
>> We do. Six stories ranging from a
0:45
dramatic comeback story in the world of
0:47
commercial space flight to a scientific
0:49
first that reshapes what we know about
0:51
planets beyond our solar system. If
0:54
you've been listening this week, you'll
0:56
know Blue Origin had a very bad
0:57
Thursday. We'll have a full update on
0:59
what comes next, but let's get into it.
1:02
>> Last Thursday night at Cape Canaveral,
1:04
Blue Origin's New Glenn rocket exploded
1:07
on its launchpad during a routine
1:09
pre-launch hotfire test. The fireball
1:12
engulfed launch complex 36. Debris was
1:15
found up to half a mile away. It was the
1:18
biggest and most public failure in the
1:20
company's history. And many observers
1:22
feared the road back could take years.
1:25
>> But as of this week, Blue Origin CEO
1:28
Dave Limp is pushing back hard on that
1:30
narrative. He's saying that damage is
1:32
far less catastrophic than it looked.
1:35
>> Limp posted a detailed update on X in
1:38
which he said that now that teams have
1:40
gained full access to the pad, there's
1:42
actually some good news. The propellant
1:44
storage infrastructure, the oxygen
1:46
tanks, the liquid hydrogen storage, and
1:49
the cryogenic methane tanks all came
1:51
through the blast in good shape. He
1:53
called that extremely fortunate because
1:56
those are very long lead items to
1:58
replace. The water tower also survived.
2:01
The main support gantry is damaged, but
2:03
crucially limp says it can be repaired
2:06
in place. It doesn't need to be torn
2:08
down and rebuilt from scratch. Perhaps
2:11
most importantly, there are spare
2:13
assets. The previously flown New Glenn
2:15
booster, nicknamed Never Tell Me the
2:17
Odds, along with three upper stages
2:20
stored in a neighboring integration
2:22
facility, all appear undamaged.
2:24
>> As for the cause of the explosion,
2:26
there's still no official word. The test
2:29
was not within the scope of FAA license
2:31
activities, so the FAA won't be leading
2:33
the investigation. Blue Origin is
2:35
conducting its own assessment. LIMP also
2:38
used the moment to announce a strategic
2:40
pivot. The company had already been
2:42
working on eliminating the need for a
2:44
transporter erector, the massive
2:47
structure used to move and stand the
2:49
rocket upright. He said Blue Origin will
2:51
now skip straight to an alternative
2:53
vertical launch concept, which means
2:55
they don't need to build a replacement
2:57
for the one destroyed during the
2:59
explosion. And he closed his statement
3:01
with Blue Origins motto gradum feroc
3:05
which means stepby step ferociously and
3:08
the declaration we will fly again before
3:11
the end of this year.
3:13
>> That's an aggressive timeline by any
3:15
measure. But it's the kind of defiant
3:17
pledge investors, customers, and the
3:19
broader space industry needed to hear.
3:22
Patrick Space Force Base has cleared
3:24
Blue Origin to begin its full damage
3:26
assessment of launch complex 36. Though
3:29
the formal rebuilding process is now
3:31
underway,
3:32
>> we will of course keep tracking the
3:34
story as it develops.
3:36
>> Now, let's move from the dramatic to the
3:38
extraordinary. Scientists have just
3:40
published what they're calling the first
3:42
direct evidence that planets beyond our
3:45
solar system possess magnetic fields,
3:47
and they found it by studying the wind.
3:51
>> This is a remarkable piece of science. A
3:53
team of astronomers used two of the
3:55
world's most powerful groundbased
3:56
telescopes, the ESO's Very Large
3:59
Telescope in Chile and the Gemini North
4:01
telescope in Hawaii to measure wind
4:03
speeds on seven so-called hot Jupiter
4:06
exoplanets. Hot Jupiters are gas giants
4:09
roughly the size of Jupiter, but
4:11
orbiting extremely close to their host
4:14
stars, far closer than Mercury is to our
4:17
sun. Because they're tidily locked,
4:19
always showing the same face to their
4:21
star. One side is perpetually scorching
4:24
hot and the other is freezing cold. That
4:28
temperature difference creates powerful
4:30
winds that howl from the day side to the
4:32
night side.
4:34
>> The researchers measured those wind
4:36
speeds and found something totally
4:37
counterintuitive. On the hotter planets,
4:40
the winds were actually slower. And that
4:42
is the opposite of what standard physics
4:44
would predict.
4:45
>> If you have more thermal energy, you'd
4:48
expect stronger winds. But these planets
4:51
are pumping the brakes. And the best
4:53
explanation, the one that actually fits
4:55
the data, is magnetic fields.
4:58
>> A magnetic field can interact with the
5:00
electrically charged gas in a planet's
5:02
upper atmosphere and slow those winds
5:04
down. The stronger the magnetic field,
5:07
the greater the breaking effect. The
5:09
team inferred magnetic field strengths
5:11
ranging up to four times that of Saturn
5:14
and up to about half the strength of
5:16
Jupiter's field. The wind speeds
5:18
themselves were extraordinary. They
5:21
ranged from around 7,000 km hour up to
5:25
more than 25,000 kmh.
5:28
For context, the fastest winds measured
5:30
on Jupiter reach about 1,500 kmh.
5:34
These are winds on a scale we simply
5:37
don't see in our own solar system. The
5:39
results were published in the journal
5:41
Nature Astronomy on June 2nd, and the
5:44
implications go well beyond just knowing
5:46
that other planets have magnetic fields.
5:49
Magnetic fields are thought to play a
5:50
critical role in protecting planetary
5:52
atmospheres from being stripped away by
5:54
stellar radiation, which is one of the
5:57
key factors in whether a planet could
5:59
over billions of years potentially
6:01
remain habitable. As the lead researcher
6:04
put it, this is a key step toward
6:07
ultimately understanding which planets
6:09
can stay alive, keep their water, and
6:12
perhaps even one day host life as we
6:14
know it.
6:15
>> A genuinely landmark result. Our next
6:19
story takes us to NASA's Gddard Space
6:21
Flight Center in Greenb Belt, Maryland,
6:23
where engineers have completed what they
6:26
describe as the last look humanity will
6:29
ever take on a critical piece of
6:31
hardware before it becomes the eyes of
6:33
humanity on the universe.
6:36
>> We're talking about the Nancy Grace
6:38
Roman Space Telescope and specifically
6:40
its primary mirror, a 2.4 4 meter 7.9 ft
6:45
reflector that will be the heart of the
6:47
instrument once it launches into space.
6:50
>> On May 20th and 21st, engineers
6:53
performed a meticulous final inspection.
6:56
They tilted the entire observatory onto
6:58
its side, deployed the protective hood
7:01
that will be stowed during launch, and
7:03
used a highresolution camera with a
7:05
powerful zoom lens to do a thorough
7:08
multi-purpose check, looking for any
7:10
particles that may have settled on the
7:12
mirror surface during testing and
7:14
confirming that the optical alignment
7:16
hadn't shifted.
7:18
>> It passed with flying colors, no specks,
7:21
no misalignment. The mirror silver
7:23
coating, which is just 400 nanome thick,
7:27
hundreds of times thinner than a human
7:29
hair, is perfect.
7:31
>> The Roman telescope manager at Goddard,
7:33
J. Scott Smith, marked the moment
7:36
beautifully. He said, "The Roman
7:38
engineering team laid eyes on the
7:40
telescope for the final time before it
7:43
in turn becomes the eyes of humanity,
7:46
revealing the wonders of the cosmos."
7:48
That's a sentence worth sitting with.
7:51
With this milestone complete, Roman will
7:53
now be shipped to Kennedy Space Center
7:55
in Florida in preparation for its
7:57
planned launch, currently scheduled for
7:59
as early as September 2026.
8:02
>> Once in space, Roman will travel to the
8:04
Sun Earth Lrange point 2, known as L2,
8:08
the same orbital neighborhood where the
8:10
James Web Space Telescope operates. It
8:12
will join the most exclusive telescope
8:15
real estate in the solar system.
8:17
>> And Roman's scientific ambitions are
8:19
extraordinary. It will have a field of
8:22
view at least 100 times larger than the
8:24
Hubble Space Telescope, potentially
8:26
measuring light from a billion galaxies
8:28
over its lifetime. It will also be
8:31
capable of directly imaging exoplanets
8:33
by blocking out starlight and conducting
8:36
a comprehensive statistical census of
8:38
planetary systems across our galaxy.
8:41
>> We are getting very close to launch.
8:43
September can't come soon enough.
8:45
>> We'll be right back after this short
8:47
break for a word from our sponsors. Stay
8:49
with us. And we're back. Three more
8:51
stories to go and they are all
8:53
fascinating.
8:54
>> Space Force has made a very large
8:56
investment in SpaceX. On May 29th, the
9:00
US Space Force announced it had awarded
9:02
Elon Musk's company a $4.16 billion
9:06
contract for a program called the
9:08
Spacebased Airborne Moving Target
9:10
Indicator, or SBMTI.
9:13
In plain language, the goal is to build
9:15
a constellation of satellites that can
9:17
track and target airborne threats from
9:19
orbit. Things like aircraft, cruise
9:22
missiles, and other fast-moving threats
9:24
anywhere on Earth at any time. The
9:26
satellites are designed to fill a gap
9:28
that currently exists in military
9:30
surveillance. Traditionally, the US
9:32
military uses aircraft, particularly
9:35
Awoks planes, to track airborne targets,
9:37
but satellites can reach areas where
9:39
it's too dangerous to fly, and they can
9:42
maintain persistent coverage that
9:44
aircraft simply can't match. The
9:46
contract is part of the Trump
9:47
administration's broader Golden Dome
9:49
missile defense initiative, which aims
9:51
to build a layered national defense
9:53
system, including groundbased
9:55
interceptors, enhanced radar networks,
9:58
and now this space-based tracking layer.
10:01
>> SpaceX isn't the only company involved.
10:03
Base Force confirmed there are nine
10:05
companies in the SBA MTI vendor pool,
10:08
though the identities of the other eight
10:10
have not been made public for national
10:12
security reasons. More contracts are
10:14
expected to be issued over the coming
10:16
year.
10:16
>> The goal is to have an initial
10:18
operational constellation of these
10:20
satellites in place by 2028. This
10:23
contract was also accompanied by a
10:25
separate $2.29 billion Space Force award
10:28
to SpaceX earlier in the week for a
10:31
space data network backbone, a secure
10:34
high-speed military communication
10:36
system. In total, SpaceX received over
10:38
$6.5 billion in Space Force contracts in
10:42
a single week. For a company that is
10:44
also preparing for what could be the
10:45
largest IPO in stock market history,
10:48
it's been quite a week in Hawthorne,
10:50
California.
10:51
>> Now, an update about a visitor that has
10:53
already left, but whose influence is
10:55
still being felt across the astronomy
10:57
community. 3i/Atlas,
11:00
the third interstellar object ever
11:02
confirmed to pass through our solar
11:04
system. Discovered on July 1st, 2025 by
11:07
the Atlas telescope network in Chile, it
11:10
is now heading back out into the deep
11:12
galaxy, never to return.
11:14
>> But the scientific conversation it
11:15
sparked is very much alive. A new
11:18
analysis published this week explores
11:20
the way that 3II/Atlas
11:22
has prompted astronomers to
11:24
fundamentally update what they
11:26
understand, not just about foreign solar
11:28
systems, but about our own. Let's do a
11:31
quick recap for listeners who may have
11:32
joined us since the main three/atlas
11:35
coverage last year. This was an
11:37
extraordinary object. It was only the
11:39
third interstellar visitor ever
11:41
confirmed after 1/uamua
11:44
in 2017 and 2i/ Boris in 2019. But
11:49
unlike those two, 3/ Atlas was clearly
11:52
an active comet, releasing dust and gas
11:55
with multiple tails and a nucleus
11:58
estimated at somewhere between a few
11:59
hundred meters and several kilome
12:02
across. It passed closest to the sun in
12:04
late October 2025, then flew by Mars,
12:08
then Jupiter in March 2026, and is now
12:10
departing. But even as it fades, the
12:13
data it generated continues to be
12:15
analyzed. One of the most striking
12:17
findings came from a University of
12:19
Michigan study that examined the water
12:21
ice in three ice/ Atlas and found it
12:24
contained an extraordinarily high
12:26
concentration of dutyium, heavy isotope
12:29
of hydrogen that is far less common in
12:31
comets from our own solar system. That
12:34
suggests three/las
12:36
formed in an environment that was
12:38
dramatically colder and more isolated
12:40
than the conditions that shaped our
12:42
solar systems comets. Researchers have
12:45
since traced its likely origin to a
12:47
cold, dark corner of the Milky Way that
12:50
had not yet fully assembled into a
12:52
planetary system when this object
12:54
formed, potentially making it up to 11
12:57
billion years old, more than twice the
12:59
age of our sun.
13:01
>> What does all of this teach us? Quite a
13:03
lot, as it turns out. It tells us that
13:05
the chemical signatures of comets vary
13:08
dramatically across the galaxy, meaning
13:10
the building blocks of planetary
13:12
systems, including the water and
13:14
organics that may seed life, differ
13:16
significantly from one stellar
13:18
neighborhood to another.
13:20
>> It also demonstrates how much we can
13:22
learn from fleeting cosmic visitors if
13:24
we have the tools to observe them
13:26
quickly. The Veraracruz Reuben
13:28
Observatory in Chile, which released its
13:30
first images in June, is expected to
13:33
dramatically increase the rate at which
13:35
we detect future interstellar objects,
13:38
which could let astronomers determine
13:40
whether three/Atlas's
13:42
unusual properties are rare or
13:44
commonplace.
13:45
>> A visitor that has left the building,
13:47
but whose lessons will be with us for
13:49
years to come.
13:50
>> Our final story today answers a question
13:53
that astrophysicists have been wrestling
13:55
with for decades. At what exact mass
13:58
does a neutron star collapse into a
14:00
black hole?
14:01
>> This is one of those wonderfully
14:03
fundamental questions in physics. We
14:05
know that when a massive star dies, it
14:07
can leave behind either a neutron star
14:09
or a black hole depending on how massive
14:12
the original star was. But the precise
14:14
boundary between those two fates has
14:17
never been definitively pinned down.
14:19
Until now, researchers at the Hunren
14:22
Wigner Research Center for Physics in
14:24
Hungary have published what they
14:26
describe as a definitive answer. The
14:28
boundary falls between 2.2 and 2.3 solar
14:32
masses. To unpack that, a neutron star
14:35
is one of the most extreme objects in
14:38
the universe. Imagine taking the mass of
14:40
two suns and compressing it into a
14:43
sphere about the size of a city. A
14:45
teaspoon of its material would weigh
14:47
billions of tons. These are objects so
14:50
dense that the neutrons themselves are
14:52
packed together like one giant atomic
14:55
nucleus. But there's a limit to how much
14:58
mass a neutron star can hold before
15:00
gravity wins and the whole thing
15:02
collapses inward to form a black hole.
15:05
That limit the Tolman Oppenheimer voloff
15:07
limit has previously been estimated to
15:10
be somewhere between two and three solar
15:12
masses depending on the assumptions
15:14
used. This new work narrows that window
15:17
considerably, placing the critical
15:19
threshold between 2.2 and 2.3 solar
15:23
masses. Beyond that, a neutron star
15:26
simply cannot support itself against
15:28
gravity, and the black hole is born. Why
15:31
does this matter? Because it gives
15:33
astronomers a clearer tool to classify
15:35
compact objects they observe. When we
15:38
detect something via gravitational waves
15:40
or X-ray observations, knowing the
15:42
precise mass boundary between neutron
15:44
stars and black holes helps us identify
15:47
what we're actually looking at.
15:49
>> It also feeds into our understanding of
15:51
what happens in neutron star mergers,
15:54
the cataclysmic collisions that produce
15:56
gravitational wave signals, and some of
15:58
the most energetic explosions in the
16:00
universe.
16:01
>> A beautifully precise answer to one of
16:03
the universe's most extreme questions.
16:06
Before we go, a quick look at the June
16:09
sky for our listeners in Australia, New
16:11
Zealand, and across the Southern
16:12
Hemisphere.
16:13
>> June is a wonderful month for southern
16:16
observers. We're heading toward the
16:17
winter solstice on June 21st, which
16:20
means longer nights, prime time for
16:22
stargazing. Jupiter and Venus are
16:25
currently visible in the western sky
16:27
after sunset. And on June 9th, they'll
16:30
appear at their closest to each other. A
16:32
spectacular conjunction worth getting
16:34
outside for. The Milky Way core is also
16:37
rising in the evening sky from the
16:39
southern hemisphere right now.
16:41
Beautifully positioned for photography
16:42
and naked eye observation in dark sky
16:45
locations away from city lights.
16:47
>> That is all from us for today. Six
16:50
stories and every one of them a reminder
16:52
that the universe is never standing
16:54
still. From Blue Origin's defiant pledge
16:57
to rise from the ashes to magnetic
17:00
fields discovered on distant worlds, it
17:02
has been a remarkable day to cover
17:04
space. If you enjoyed today's episode,
17:07
please subscribe, leave us a review, and
17:10
tell a fellow space lover about the
17:11
show. Find us on Instagram, Facebook,
17:14
and x at astroaily pod and at
17:17
astronomyaily.io.
17:19
>> I'm Avery.
17:20
>> And I'm Anna. We'll see you tomorrow.
17:22
And until then, keep looking up.
17:36
Stories told.