Latest / Space News Today / Runaway Black Hole Confirmed, Mercury Still Active & 2032 Moon Impact Risk

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Runaway Black Hole Confirmed, Mercury Still Active & 2032 Moon Impact Risk · Space News Today

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Welcome to Astronomy [music] Daily, your
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source for the latest space and
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astronomy news. I'm Anna.
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>> And I'm Avery. Thanks for joining us on
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this Thursday, February 29th, [music]
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2026. We've got a fascinating lineup
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today, covering everything from
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Mercury's surprising geological activity
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to a possible [music] asteroid impact on
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the moon.
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>> That's right. We're going to explore
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bright streaks on Mercury that suggest
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[music] our smallest planet is still
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geologically active. Check in on NASA's
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[music] test satellite after a command
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error temporarily sidelined it. And
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discuss the discovery of an intriguing
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Earthlike exoplanet that's much [music]
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colder than you might expect. Plus,
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we'll bring you updates on NASA and
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SpaceX moving up the Crew 12 launch to
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help out the skeleton crew [music]
0:49
currently on the International Space
0:50
Station. Then we'll dive into the wild
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world of runaway black holes tearing
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through space and wrap up with what
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could be a once-in-a-lifetime [music]
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scientific opportunity if an asteroid
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hits the moon in 2032.
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>> It's quite a ride today. [music] Let's
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get started with some surprising news
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from the innermost planet in our solar
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system.
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>> Mercury has long been viewed as a small
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geologically dead world, but new
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research is challenging that assumption
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in a big way. A team led by researchers
1:21
at the University of Burn has uncovered
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hundreds of bright linear streaks on
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crater slopes that point to ongoing
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volcanic activity and volatile loss from
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Mercury's interior.
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>> This is really fascinating work, Avery.
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The team applied deep learning
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techniques to analyze about 100,000
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highresolution images taken by NASA's
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Messenger spacecraft during its orbital
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mission from 2011 to 2015. Using this
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automated approach, they mapped the
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global distribution of roughly 400
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bright streaks that had previously
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escaped comprehensive cataloging.
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>> And what they found was pretty telling.
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These features, known as slope lineier,
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occur preferentially on sun-facing
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slopes inside relatively young impact
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craters that cut through thick volcanic
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deposits. The concentration of streaks
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in these thermally stressed environments
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indicates that solar heating is an
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important trigger for volatile escape
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from near surface layers. Much of these
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streaks originate in small bright
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depressions called hollows that dot
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crater floors and walls. These hollows
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have long been interpreted as products
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of volatile loss and their close
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association with the lineier supports
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the view that both structures form when
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volatile components like sulfur or other
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light elements escape from the
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subsurface.
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>> According to the research team, fracture
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networks created by the original impact
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events likely provide pathways that
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allow volatile rich material from deeper
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levels to reach the surface. As solar
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radiation warms these exposed zones,
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volatiles can escape into space, driving
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the development or modification of the
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bright streaks down slope. What's
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particularly exciting is the timing.
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This research arrives just as the joint
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ESA and JAXA Becky Columbbo mission is
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on route to Mercury. The mission carries
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an advanced payload that includes
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several key contributions from the
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University of Burn.
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>> Absolutely. The Becky Columbbo laser
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altimeter or Bella was designed and
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built in part at the University of Burn.
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It will use laser pulses from an orbit
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roughly a thousand km above the surface
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to measure elevations with about 10 cm
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precision, enabling a detailed
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reconstruction of Mercury's topography.
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The burn team also contributed the ion
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optical system for Stroio, a NASA mass
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spectrometer on Bey Columbo that will
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measure the composition of Mercury's
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extremely thin atmosphere, connecting
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present-day volatile escape at the
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surface to the surrounding exosphere.
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The research team plans to use the
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current inventory of slope streaks as a
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baseline for future comparisons once
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Beepy Columbbo begins returning data. By
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imaging key regions again, they aim to
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determine whether new streaks have
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formed or existing ones have changed
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since the messenger era. Any such
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changes would provide strong evidence
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that volatiled driven processes are
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still reshaping Mercury's surface on
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human [snorts] time scales.
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>> It's a great reminder that even our
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smallest, closest planetary neighbor
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still has secrets to reveal. Mercury is
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far more dynamic than we thought.
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Shifting from Mercury to our planet
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hunting efforts, NASA's Transiting
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Exoplanet Survey Satellite, or TESS,
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recently had a bit of a scare when a
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command error temporarily knocked it
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offline. Right, the spacecraft was
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forced into safe mode after an
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unexpected command error caused its
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solar panels to misalign with the sun.
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This misalignment had serious
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consequences because the panels were
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unable to charge Tessa's batteries,
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leading to a low power condition that
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triggered the automatic transition to
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safe mode. In safe mode, all
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non-essential systems are turned off to
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conserve power, and the spacecraft
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awaits further instructions from ground
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controllers. NASA engineers quickly work
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to resolve the issue. And fortunately,
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TESS safe mode performed as intended,
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protecting the spacecraft from permanent
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damage. This incident is actually
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reminiscent of past missing failures.
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Remember Viking 1 back in 1982? A faulty
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command caused the loss of communication
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and there was that catastrophic series
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of events that nearly destroyed the SOHO
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probe in 1998. But unlike those cases,
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TESS was fortunate to have safeguards in
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place.
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>> Exactly. The spacecraft's automatic safe
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mode kicked in when the power situation
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became critical. The safe mode is
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designed to preserve the spacecraft's
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core functions such as attitude control
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and ensure it can be reactivated once
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engineers identify and address the
6:00
issue. According to NASA, the mission
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team is now reviewing and updating
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procedures to prevent this command error
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from happening in the future. It's a
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good reminder that even with advanced
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technology, human error remains a
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significant challenge in space
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operations.
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>> Absolutely. While Tessa's recovery was
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successful and demonstrates how far
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space mission technology has come, this
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incident emphasizes the need for
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continued vigilance in mission planning.
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The risk of human error is always there
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and the consequences can be costly in
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terms of both time and resources.
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>> The good news is that TESS is back
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online and continuing its important work
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of hunting for exoplanets, which brings
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us nicely to our next story about a
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newly discovered Earthlike world.
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Speaking of exoplanets, astronomers have
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just discovered what might be one of the
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closest things we have to Earth's twin,
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though it's considerably colder than our
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home planet. The exoplanet is called
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HD137010b,
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and it's located 146 lighty years away.
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It's slightly larger than Earth and
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orbits a star that resembles our sun.
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However, despite its similarities to
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Earth in terms of size and orbital
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period, its surface could be far colder
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than even Mars, potentially reaching a
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frigid -90° F or -68° C.
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>> This discovery was published in the
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astrophysical journal Letters and was
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made by an international team led by
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Alexander Venner. The search for
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Earthlike exoplanets has been a central
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focus of astronomical research for over
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three decades now. Dr. Hang, a key
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member of the research team, explained
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it well when he said, "Since the
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discovery of the first exoplanet 30
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years ago, we've always tried to find
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Earth's Trin. HD137010b
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could bring us closer to that goal,
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although it's not an exact match. The
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planet is positioned in what astronomers
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call the habitable zone of its star,
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which is the area where water could
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potentially exist in liquid form, which
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is crucial for life as we know it.
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However, there's a major obstacle.
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>> Right? The star HD137010b
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orbits is cooler and dimmer than our
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sun, meaning the planet receives only a
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fraction of the energy Earth does. This
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could result in surface temperatures as
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low as -90° F, making it one of the
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coldest exoplanets discovered in recent
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years. But scientists remain hopeful.
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Dr. Venner pointed out that while the
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planet's surface might be frozen, it
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could still fall within the broader
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optimistic habitable zone of its star.
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With the right atmospheric conditions,
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HD137010b
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might not be as inhospitable as its
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temperature suggests. One of the
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challenges of studying this planet is
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its orbital distance from its star,
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which is similar to Earth's, but much
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farther than the typical exoplanets that
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are easier to observe. Transits, when
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the planet crosses in front of its star,
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happen less frequently, making it harder
9:08
to confirm the planet's existence.
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>> The discovery was made from a single
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transit captured by NASA's Kepler Space
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Telescope. Further confirmation of the
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planet's existence and detailed analysis
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of its mass and atmosphere will require
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more data, which might not be possible
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until the next generation of telescopes
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become operational.
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>> It's an exciting discovery that adds to
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our understanding of the types of
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environments where life could
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potentially exist beyond our solar
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system. Even if HD137010B
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is too cold for life as we know it, it
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teaches us valuable lessons about
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planetary habitability.
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>> Now, let's turn our attention back to
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Earth orbit and the International Space
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Station. NASA has announced an earlier
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than expected target date to launch the
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next astronauts to the ISS.
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>> That's right. The agency is now
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targeting February 11th for liftoff of
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Space X Crew 12 mission, which will fly
10:07
four astronauts to join the skeleton
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crew presently operating the orbital
10:11
laboratory. That's 4 days earlier than
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originally planned.
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>> Just to give everyone context, currently
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only three crew members are covering the
10:20
maintenance and science investigations
10:22
aboard the ISS. They were left behind on
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January 14th by the early departure of
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crew 11 on the station's first ever
10:30
medical evacuation. The crew 12
10:33
astronauts were already in line to take
10:35
the crew 11's quartet's place, but they
10:38
had originally been scheduled to overlap
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with them before their return to Earth.
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SpaceX and NASA had originally targeted
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February 15th for Crew 12's launch, but
10:48
managed to get the mission's Crew Dragon
10:50
spacecraft and Falcon 9 rocket ready
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ahead of schedule.
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>> The Crew 12 team includes NASA
10:57
astronauts Jessica Mir, who's the
10:59
mission commander, and Jack Hathaway as
11:02
pilot. The mission specialists are
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Sophie Adinot of the European Space
11:07
Agency, and Ross Cosmos cosminaut Andre
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Fedyv. Interestingly, Fedyav was a
11:13
relatively late replacement for
11:15
cosminaut Alleg Ardmiv, who was pulled
11:18
off crew 12 in early December, possibly
11:20
for violating US national security
11:23
regulations. This quartet will fly the
11:26
Crew Dragon capsule named Grace to the
11:28
ISS for a longer than normal assignment
11:31
lasting 9 months instead of the typical
11:33
6 months. It'll be the second space
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flight for both Mayor and Fedyav, while
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Hathaway and Adeno are both spaceflight
11:41
rookies headed to orbit for the first
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time. The launch window opens on
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February 11th at 6:00 a.m. Eastern time
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from launch complex 40 at Cape Canaveral
11:50
Space Force Station in Florida. If they
11:53
don't manage to launch that day, there
11:55
are backup opportunities on February
11:57
12th and 13th. The crew 12 astronauts
12:00
will join NASA Chris Williams and
12:02
cosminauts Sergey Kuds Verskovv and
12:05
Serge Mikayv as part of ISS expedition
12:08
74 which will eventually transition to
12:11
expedition 75 before the end of crew
12:14
12's rotation. It's great to see the
12:16
relief crew heading up sooner to help
12:18
out the skeleton crew currently managing
12:20
the station.
12:22
>> Now for something truly mindbending.
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Astronomers have confirmed the first
12:27
runaway super massive black hole, and
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it's leaving quite a trail behind it.
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>> This is wild stuff, Anna. The black hole
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was identified by a 200,000 light-year
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tail and a supersonic bow shock in the
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cosmic owl galaxy, which is actually a
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pair of ring galaxies about 8.8 billion
12:46
lightyears away. The rings appear as owl
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eyes as they get closer and closer to
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merging. The research led by Peter von
12:53
Dakam from Yale's astronomy department
12:56
was confirmed using observations from
12:58
the James Webb Space Telescope. The
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central proposal is that this linear
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feature is the wake behind a runaway
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super massive black hole and this is
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strongly supported by their analysis.
13:11
>> But how does something weighing
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potentially millions or even billions of
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times the mass of our sun get kicked out
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of a galaxy? The answer lies in galaxy
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mergers. When big galaxies collide and
13:22
merge, they force the black holes at
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their respective centers into close
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proximity.
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>> Right? If two black holes become locked
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in a gravitational dance and then a
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third crashes in from another emerging
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galaxy, the resulting instability can
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hurl one of the trio away at sufficient
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speed to exit the host galaxy entirely.
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This can happen through two main
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mechanisms.
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>> The first is gravitational wave recoil.
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When black holes merge, they emitate
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gravitational waves that can give the
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resulting black hole a velocity boost of
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up to several thousand km/s,
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propelling it away from the galactic
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center.
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>> The second mechanism is the classical
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slingshot scenario. In this case, a
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longived binary black hole forms through
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a merger of two galaxies. When a third
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super massive black hole is introduced
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in a second merger, the threebody
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interaction can eject one of the black
14:15
holes, usually the lightest one.
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>> What's particularly striking about this
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confirmed runaway black hole is the
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trail it leaves behind. As the black
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hole plows through intergalactic space,
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it compresses tenuous gas in front of
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it, which precipitates the birth of hot
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blue stars. This creates a 200,000
14:34
lightyear long contrail of young stars.
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The black hole also generates a bow
14:39
shock at the head of this week.
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Something the researchers predicted
14:42
based on shock models. From the ages of
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the stars in the trail, they deduced
14:47
that the black hole escaped about 40
14:49
million years ago and is barreling
14:51
through space at roughly 1,600 km per
14:54
second.
14:55
>> To put that in perspective, that's fast
14:57
enough to travel from Earth to the moon
14:59
in about 14 minutes. It's an incredible
15:02
speed for something so massive. Recent
15:05
papers have shown images of surprisingly
15:07
straight streaks of stars within
15:09
galaxies that seem to be convincing
15:11
evidence for runaway black holes. One
15:14
paper describes a very distant galaxy
15:16
imaged by James Webb with a bright
15:18
contrail suggesting a black hole with a
15:21
mass 10 million times the mass of the
15:23
sun.
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>> It's a reminder that the universe is
15:26
even more dynamic and violent than we
15:28
often imagine. These behemoths aren't
15:30
just sitting quietly at the centers of
15:32
galaxies. Some of them are literally
15:34
tearing through space, creating new
15:36
stars in their wake.
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>> And finally, let's talk about an
15:39
upcoming event that has both exciting
15:42
scientific potential and some concerning
15:45
risks. On December 22nd, 2032, asteroid
15:49
2024 YR4 has a 4% chance of actually
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striking the moon.
15:55
>> A 4% chance might not sound like much,
15:58
but it's definitely non-negligible. If
16:01
this collision does happen, it will
16:03
release enough energy to be the
16:05
equivalent of smacking our nearest
16:07
neighbor with a medium-sized thermal
16:09
nuclear weapon. It would be six orders
16:11
of magnitude more powerful than the last
16:13
major impact on the moon, which happened
16:16
back in 2013.
16:17
>> A new paper from Yeon Hei of Chin Wua
16:20
University looks at the potential
16:22
scientific opportunities if this
16:23
collision occurs. And while they can
16:25
simulate models of how the impact will
16:28
go, monitoring it as it happens will
16:30
provide never before collected actual
16:32
data that's infeasible to get any other
16:35
way.
16:35
>> The impact would vaporize rock and
16:37
plasma and would be clearly visible from
16:39
the Pacific region where it will be
16:42
nighttime during the impact. Even days
16:44
after the impact, the melt pool of the
16:46
impacted material will still be cooling,
16:49
allowing infrared observers like the
16:51
James Web Space Telescope to capture
16:53
plenty of data. The impact should form a
16:55
crater roughly 1 kilometer wide and 150
16:59
to 260 m deep with a 100 meter pool of
17:03
molten rock at the center. Comparing it
17:06
in size to other craters scattered
17:08
around the moon will help us understand
17:10
its bombardment history.
17:12
>> The impact will also set off a global
17:14
moon quake of magnitude 5.0. That would
17:17
be the strongest moonquake yet detected
17:19
by any seismometer on the moon. Watching
17:22
the propagation of the moonquake will
17:24
shine a light on the moon's interior and
17:26
help researchers understand its
17:28
composition.
17:28
>> And here's where it gets really
17:30
spectacular. A final piece of the
17:32
scientific puzzle will be the debris
17:34
field created by the blast. Up to 400 kg
17:38
of lunar material is expected to survive
17:41
re-entry to Earth, creating essentially
17:43
a free largecale lunar sample return
17:46
mission. At its peak, right around
17:48
Christmas of 2032, simulations expect up
17:51
to 20 million meteors per hour to hit
17:54
our atmosphere, at least on the leading
17:56
edge of the planet. Most of them would
17:58
have naked eye visibility, including
17:59
some 100 to 400 fireballs per hour. But
18:03
there is a downside to all of this. That
18:06
400 kg of meteors has to land somewhere.
18:09
And it looks like the crosshairs fall
18:11
squarely on South America, North Africa,
18:13
and the Arabian Peninsula. A few
18:16
kilograms of space rock falling on Dubai
18:18
could certainly cause some damage.
18:20
>> Perhaps more dangerous is the risk of
18:22
satellite mega constellations that play
18:24
such an important role in our modern-day
18:26
navigation and internet systems. Such an
18:29
event could trigger Kesler syndrome and
18:31
bring the entire network down over the
18:34
span of a few short years while also
18:36
locking us out from being able to get
18:38
anything else safely into orbit for much
18:40
longer. Due to the risks, some space
18:43
agencies are already considering a
18:44
deflection mission that would bump
18:46
asteroid 2024 YR4 out of the way of a
18:50
potential lunar collision. But that
18:52
hasn't been set in stone yet. Neither
18:54
has the actual impact itself with only a
18:57
4% chance of happening. If the odds
18:59
increase over the coming years, we as a
19:02
species will have to decide whether it's
19:04
worth it to deflect it or not. If we do,
19:07
we might miss out on a whole bunch of
19:08
cool science, but we also might save our
19:11
entire orbital infrastructure and the
19:13
few lives directly to boot.
19:14
>> And that wraps up today's episode of
19:16
Astronomy Daily. From Mercury's
19:19
surprising activity to a possible lunar
19:21
impact in our future, space continues to
19:24
surprise and amaze us.
19:26
>> Thanks for joining us today. For more
19:28
space news and to explore our archive of
19:30
episodes, visit our website at
19:31
astronomydaily.io.
19:34
You can also find us on social media at
19:36
Astro Daily Pod on X, Facebook,
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Instagram, and YouTube.
19:40
>> If you enjoyed today's show, please
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subscribe on your favorite podcast
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platform and leave us a review. It
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really helps other space enthusiasts
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find us.
19:48
>> Until next time, keep looking up.
19:50
>> Clear skies, everyone. Astronomy [music]
19:53
day. [singing]
19:55
Stories been told.
20:03
Stories to tell.
20:11
[singing]