Latest / Space Nuts: Astronomy Insights & Cosmic Discoveries / The Hidden Impact of Landslides on Pluto’s Surface — What Scientists Are Discovering

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The Hidden Impact of Landslides on Pluto’s Surface — What Scientists Are Discovering · Space Nuts: Astronomy Insights & Cosmic Discoveries

• 0:00
  Andrew Dunkley: Hello again. Thank you for joining us. This
• 0:01
  is Space Nuts. My name is Andrew
• 0:04
  Dunkley. Great to have your company yet
• 0:06
  again. Coming up on this episode,
• 0:09
  landslides on Pluto.
• 0:12
  Yes, apparently. So, uh, China pulls
• 0:14
  off a SpaceX trick. And, uh, this is
• 0:17
  a really interesting story. Um, we'll have to
• 0:20
  watch our P's and Q's on this, but the White
• 0:22
  House has established a UFO study group. And
• 0:24
  guess who's in charge? The. No, it's not the
• 0:27
  president. Uh, it's someone else. Almost as
• 0:30
  wacky. Uh, we'll do all of those stories on
• 0:33
  this episode of space nuts.
• 0:35
  Professor Fred Watson: 15 seconds. Guidance is internal.
• 0:38
  10, 9. Ignition
• 0:40
  sequence start.
• 0:41
  Professor Fred Watson: Um, space nuts.
• 0:43
  Professor Fred Watson: 5, 4, 3, 2. 1, 2, 3, 4,
• 0:45
  5, 5, 4, 3, 2, 1.
• 0:47
  Andrew Dunkley: Space nuts.
• 0:49
  Professor Fred Watson: Astronauts report it feels good.
• 0:51
  Andrew Dunkley: And speaking of wacky, uh, we are joined once
• 0:54
  again by Professor Fred Watson, astronomer at
• 0:56
  large. Uh, sporting rather significant
• 0:59
  bump on the head.
• 1:01
  Professor Fred Watson: Uh, yes, actually, it's two.
• 1:04
  One bigger than the other. It almost looks
• 1:05
  like a planet with its moon in orbit around
• 1:08
  it. As a visual aid,
• 1:10
  uh, walking into
• 1:12
  Andrew Dunkley: doors will do that to you.
• 1:13
  Professor Fred Watson: It's what happened. And it's all astronomy's
• 1:16
  fault because every night I tend to go out on
• 1:18
  our. We've got a terrace that faces north,
• 1:21
  which is where all the planets are if you're
• 1:22
  in the southern hemisphere. I usually go
• 1:25
  out and just have a look at the sky before I
• 1:27
  go to bed, being an astronomer, but.
• 1:30
  And normally, um, I check the screen doors
• 1:33
  open. But last night I was thinking of
• 1:35
  something else and I just walked right into
• 1:36
  the screen door. And it's quite a solid
• 1:38
  screen door, so I can see that. Yes,
• 1:41
  yeah, yeah.
• 1:43
  Andrew Dunkley: Oh, we've all done it, Fred
• 1:46
  and
• 1:46
  Professor Fred Watson: I. I've done it, too, but not quite as
• 1:48
  spectacular as this, fortunately. Um,
• 1:51
  if I put a beanie on so I look like a
• 1:53
  criminal, you don't see the bullet holes. Uh,
• 1:57
  and where are we going next week? Uh, I'll
• 1:59
  probably have to have a hat on all the time
• 2:01
  anyway, so.
• 2:02
  Andrew Dunkley: Yeah, the worst one I ever did was at
• 2:04
  golf. I had to duck off to the,
• 2:07
  um, gentleman's room, which, uh, they
• 2:10
  have them all over the golf course. And this
• 2:11
  one's right up one end of the course, but
• 2:13
  they've got a water tank next to it, which is
• 2:15
  shrouded in trees. And I knew it was there,
• 2:18
  so I ducked, but I didn't duck enough. Uh,
• 2:21
  and I went. My forehead went straight into
• 2:25
  the metal bit that was holding it up like
• 2:28
  a big. Oh, my gosh, it nearly knocked me out.
• 2:31
  Professor Fred Watson: I bet it Did. Yeah, yeah, I bet you were in.
• 2:34
  I bet you were a mess.
• 2:37
  Andrew Dunkley: I had a dreadful headache. Um, there was this
• 2:40
  awful clang, but no one saw me because I was
• 2:42
  in the trees.
• 2:43
  Professor Fred Watson: Yeah, yeah.
• 2:44
  Andrew Dunkley: But um, yeah, that was not good.
• 2:47
  Professor Fred Watson: No, you're lucky, uh, you didn't do yourself
• 2:49
  one of those brain injuries.
• 2:51
  Andrew Dunkley: Maybe I have, Fred.
• 2:53
  Professor Fred Watson: Well, it's funny, funny you should mention
• 2:55
  that, Andrew. We'll
• 2:58
  see how things go.
• 2:59
  Andrew Dunkley: Yes, uh, let's get stuck into our
• 3:02
  stories. The very first story is about
• 3:05
  landslides. Now we have, we have our fair
• 3:07
  share of landslides on Earth. I've uh, seen
• 3:09
  some dreadful images, uh, online of um,
• 3:13
  huge, I mean massive landslides in some parts
• 3:16
  of the world. Yeah, I've um, I've not
• 3:18
  witnessed one close up and personal,
• 3:20
  thankfully. But I've seen the aftermath of a
• 3:23
  few in Australia where um, landslides
• 3:26
  are not uncommon. Uh, and I've seen a few
• 3:29
  overseas where pieces of mountain have just
• 3:31
  slipped off and um,
• 3:35
  it can be pretty chaotic and unfortunately
• 3:38
  has um, led to fatalities. I uh,
• 3:41
  don't think that's a problem on Pluto in
• 3:43
  terms of fatalities. But uh, it is something
• 3:46
  that happens. Uh, and we've not seen that on
• 3:48
  Pluto before.
• 3:50
  Professor Fred Watson: Correct. Uh, and just while we're talking
• 3:53
  about that, you're absolutely right, um, that
• 3:56
  landslides ah, are playing
• 3:59
  actually an increasing role on our own
• 4:01
  planet. Um, as you know, we were up in
• 4:04
  Greenland at the beginning of last year, not
• 4:06
  next year, beginning of last year. And um,
• 4:10
  met online, um, a researcher
• 4:13
  who'd studied this, um, um, basically
• 4:15
  a landslide in one of the Greenland
• 4:18
  fjords where um,
• 4:21
  climate change had reduced the height of a
• 4:24
  glacier. And that glacier was propping
• 4:26
  up half a mountain.
• 4:29
  And as it melted, the half mountain gave
• 4:32
  way and tumbled down the 45
• 4:35
  degree slope, uh,
• 4:39
  onto the glacier, sorry, tumbled
• 4:42
  onto the Glacier, down the 45 degree slope
• 4:44
  into the fjord and set up this
• 4:47
  oscillation, uh, which I think we talked
• 4:50
  about a couple of times on Space Nuts.
• 4:53
  It's called a sesh or a seash, I think, where
• 4:55
  it's like water swelling from side to side in
• 4:58
  your bath. But it did it for, what was it,
• 5:00
  four days or something? Every nine minutes.
• 5:03
  It was extraordinary. And that's how it was
• 5:05
  picked up by the world's seismologists.
• 5:08
  So a changing climate can increase
• 5:11
  landslides. Now we're not saying that's
• 5:13
  what's happening on Pluto, uh, but, uh,
• 5:16
  there are landslides on Pluto. And of course
• 5:19
  pretty well everything we know about Pluto
• 5:21
  now comes from that flyby of the New
• 5:24
  Horizons spacecraft. If I remember rightly,
• 5:26
  it was 14 July 2015,
• 5:29
  a momentous occasion uh, for astronomers and
• 5:32
  planetary scientists when we got the first
• 5:34
  close ups of the dwarf planet Pluto
• 5:37
  with that heart shaped plane, uh,
• 5:39
  Sputnik Planitia, uh, facing
• 5:42
  us that people made into a likeness of Pluto
• 5:45
  the dog. It was all great stuff, uh, that
• 5:48
  is mostly um, sort of slushy
• 5:51
  or solid nitrogen that makes up
• 5:53
  that very flat plane. And people think there
• 5:56
  are glaciers in, at the edge of that as well.
• 5:59
  But the basin in which that plane uh
• 6:02
  formed was uh, probably caused by
• 6:05
  an impact billions of years ago, uh,
• 6:08
  that caused a depression in the surface. But
• 6:10
  we think the surface itself is made pretty
• 6:13
  well of solid water ice.
• 6:16
  Uh, and so what you've got is
• 6:18
  this large region on Pluto which
• 6:21
  is surrounded by a very
• 6:24
  fractured landscape. I remember looking at
• 6:27
  some of the mountains around the edge of that
• 6:29
  and they look just like ice cubes
• 6:32
  at the edge of a drink. And that's probably
• 6:34
  what they are, but they're four kilometers
• 6:37
  high. You know, these are things that
• 6:39
  probably were pushed to one side by whatever
• 6:41
  caused that impact. Yeah, but it's in
• 6:44
  that area around the edge of Sputnik
• 6:47
  Planitia that these
• 6:50
  um, uh, landslides have been found
• 6:53
  on Pluto. Uh, and it's um, actually
• 6:56
  some scientists, um, I think they're in Italy
• 6:59
  if I remember rightly, uh, who have
• 7:01
  um, national uh, Research Council
• 7:05
  in Perugia in Italy, uh, they
• 7:08
  have looked more closely at
• 7:11
  the images that came back from New
• 7:14
  Horizons and they think they've
• 7:16
  identified, I think it's about half a dozen
• 7:19
  uh, landslides, uh, which are
• 7:22
  uh, quite significant in size
• 7:26
  but all tend to be around the edge of
• 7:29
  that, of that um,
• 7:32
  flat plane, the
• 7:34
  Sputnik Polynitia.
• 7:36
  Andrew Dunkley: So they're sliding into the
• 7:39
  crater, is that what we're saying?
• 7:41
  Professor Fred Watson: Well what we're seeing is uh,
• 7:44
  actually at least one of them is sliding into
• 7:46
  a crater. The crater is not far from the edge
• 7:48
  of Sputnik Planitia, but it's not the edge.
• 7:51
  Um, and what they've done is they've noted,
• 7:54
  you know, a region in the crater wall that's
• 7:57
  got a break in it, uh, that
• 8:00
  corresponds with debris on the crater floor.
• 8:04
  Um, and that's the, seems to be
• 8:07
  the smoking gun, if I can put it that way.
• 8:10
  Um,
• 8:14
  the biggest of them is huge, it's 130 square
• 8:16
  kilometers, um, which is very large,
• 8:20
  um, and certainly would be a very big
• 8:23
  landslide on planet Earth. And their
• 8:26
  heights are ah, one
• 8:29
  and a half to 2.2 kilometers is what
• 8:32
  they're Talking about. So that's quite a
• 8:34
  high, um, you know, a high
• 8:37
  uh, drop zone, if I can put it that way.
• 8:39
  Andrew Dunkley: Yes.
• 8:40
  Professor Fred Watson: And what they're saying is that
• 8:43
  uh, the, the material that
• 8:46
  falls down in the landslide down the
• 8:48
  slope, uh, actually goes
• 8:51
  further into the flat area that
• 8:54
  it's running into. And in this case it's the
• 8:56
  floor of a crater, um, that
• 8:59
  uh, it goes further than it would do
• 9:02
  elsewhere in the solar system, for example on
• 9:05
  Earth. Uh, and what they are suggesting is
• 9:08
  that that means there's less friction uh,
• 9:11
  in this material. So it goes
• 9:13
  further over the landscape. And um,
• 9:16
  and maybe that confirms that
• 9:20
  what the material is, that's sliding down is
• 9:22
  actually water ice. Although they don't say
• 9:24
  that in the report I've read. That's an
• 9:27
  inference from me. But uh, it sounds, it
• 9:29
  would make sense though.
• 9:31
  Andrew Dunkley: Most of the surface of Pluto is water
• 9:34
  ice. And of course it's so cold, like minus
• 9:37
  230 degrees Celsius. Um,
• 9:40
  the ice is like rock.
• 9:42
  Professor Fred Watson: Solid rock. That's right. Absolutely hard as
• 9:45
  rock. Yeah.
• 9:46
  Andrew Dunkley: And the mountains on Pluto are massive.
• 9:48
  Massive for a small place.
• 9:50
  Professor Fred Watson: Yes, they ah, are huge.
• 9:51
  Andrew Dunkley: Like up to 6.2 kilometers in
• 9:54
  height, 3.9 miles.
• 9:56
  Professor Fred Watson: Yeah.
• 9:56
  Andrew Dunkley: Um, up around the 20,000ft mark. I
• 9:59
  mean that would be a big mountain on Earth.
• 10:02
  Professor Fred Watson: It would. That's right. And here's a world
• 10:04
  that's um, well less than a quarter of the
• 10:06
  Earth's diameter. It's smaller than the moon.
• 10:08
  Uh, it's remarkable though. And you know,
• 10:11
  all credit to these scientists who've been
• 10:14
  very patient in their work
• 10:17
  combing these images for things that
• 10:20
  look like landslides. Because that's the only
• 10:22
  clue you've got is the appearance, uh,
• 10:25
  from, from above. But the fact that you're
• 10:27
  seeing maybe material in the side of a
• 10:30
  crater that's, that's different from the, the
• 10:33
  walls of the crater around it because it's
• 10:35
  been, it's, you know, it's, it's actually
• 10:37
  fallen down.
• 10:38
  Professor Fred Watson: Yeah.
• 10:39
  Professor Fred Watson: Remarkable stuff.
• 10:40
  Andrew Dunkley: It is. And, and we've seen landslides on
• 10:42
  other planets.
• 10:43
  Professor Fred Watson: Yes, yep, uh, certainly. And also
• 10:46
  on some of the other moons. Um,
• 10:49
  uh, apparently. Well, some of the features on
• 10:52
  Phobos, which is a very strange little world
• 10:55
  dominated by a huge crater called Stickney,
• 10:59
  uh, that has landscape,
• 11:02
  sorry, landslides as well. Uh, the asteroid
• 11:04
  Vesta, which the new, uh, sorry, the dawn
• 11:07
  spacecraft was in orbit around before it went
• 11:09
  on to Ceres, that's got landslides.
• 11:12
  Um, and so what they're saying is, you know,
• 11:14
  you'd expect a world like Pluto also
• 11:17
  to have landslides. But um, it's taken
• 11:20
  what uh 11 years now since a
• 11:22
  flyby uh for anyone to find them.
• 11:25
  But they found the evidence of six
• 11:28
  features that look like landslides.
• 11:30
  Andrew Dunkley: Actually as we record Fred, it's exactly 11
• 11:33
  years today.
• 11:34
  Professor Fred Watson: So it is.
• 11:36
  Andrew Dunkley: I just noticed that.
• 11:37
  Professor Fred Watson: So it is the 14th of July. Yes, M
• 11:40
  2015 it was. That's right. Well there you go.
• 11:42
  Andrew Dunkley: People are saying 14th of July, they're
• 11:44
  recording on the 14th of July and this
• 11:45
  thing's coming out on the, the uh 7th of
• 11:47
  August. What's going on? We're jumping ahead
• 11:49
  because Fred's got another trip.
• 11:51
  Professor Fred Watson: Yes, sorry about that.
• 11:52
  Andrew Dunkley: Not like the trip he had into the screen door
• 11:54
  last night.
• 11:56
  Professor Fred Watson: No, I'll try and avoid screen doors in
• 11:59
  future.
• 12:00
  Andrew Dunkley: Now it's a fascinating story. Landslides,
• 12:03
  probably made of water. Water ice on Pluto.
• 12:06
  You can read all about it. Uh, well there's a
• 12:08
  few places um, fizz.org's got a great article
• 12:11
  about it and uh, you can also read the paper
• 12:14
  which was published in the journal Icarus.
• 12:17
  This is Space Nuts. Andrew Dunkley and
• 12:19
  Professor Fred Watson.
• 12:23
  Professor Fred Watson: Hey, that's one of the better sims, believe
• 12:25
  me. We've had a couple of cardiac arrests
• 12:27
  down here too Pete. There weren't any
• 12:29
  turf.
• 12:31
  Andrew Dunkley: Space Nuts. Okay Fred, let's
• 12:33
  move on to our uh, next story.
• 12:36
  And we've seen a lot lately
• 12:39
  about SpaceX and its exploits and its success
• 12:42
  with uh, reusable
• 12:44
  boosters that uh, land themselves back
• 12:47
  on ocean going platforms and other
• 12:50
  places. Places um, they've had some
• 12:52
  deconstructive events as well. Yes,
• 12:55
  um, but uh, and a few other players have
• 12:58
  attempted this not so successfully. Um,
• 13:00
  now it looks like China's in on the game.
• 13:04
  Professor Fred Watson: That's correct. We've had um, so uh,
• 13:08
  Blue Origin has also managed to
• 13:11
  uh, do the soft landing trick at ah, least
• 13:14
  once I think. Um, but
• 13:17
  this is the first time we've got a record
• 13:20
  of a country uh,
• 13:22
  other than America uh basically
• 13:25
  pulling off this trick of
• 13:28
  grabbing your booster before it's thrown
• 13:30
  away, uh landing it softly and
• 13:33
  saving it for another time. Uh and
• 13:37
  the fascinating aspect of this
• 13:40
  Andrew is the way it's been done by the
• 13:43
  China Aerospace Science and Technology
• 13:46
  Corporation. Um, they
• 13:48
  have rather than do this you
• 13:51
  know, fine needle control uh,
• 13:54
  of the rockets,
• 13:57
  the basically the, the rockets that are
• 13:59
  firing to slow down the spacecraft as it
• 14:01
  descends to Earth, uh and basically
• 14:04
  pivoting it down onto, onto its
• 14:07
  legs, which is certainly what happens with
• 14:09
  The Falcon uh nine rockets. SpaceX's
• 14:12
  uh, Starship actually has
• 14:15
  what they Call them the chopsticks. These two
• 14:17
  arms on the launch tower that just
• 14:20
  grab them and hold it. And in a way, uh, what
• 14:22
  we're seeing from the Chinese, uh, um,
• 14:26
  experiment, if I can put it that way, or
• 14:27
  project, is similar to that, uh, because
• 14:30
  you're sort of grabbing it, but not with
• 14:33
  pincers or chopsticks. Uh,
• 14:35
  basically you're putting it into a net
• 14:39
  as it lands.
• 14:40
  Andrew Dunkley: There's a. I reckon they'd be pretty good at
• 14:42
  using the chopsticks method.
• 14:43
  Professor Fred Watson: Yeah, why did I miss
• 14:46
  that one? That's a great one. Yeah, they
• 14:48
  probably would.
• 14:50
  Andrew Dunkley: They're pretty good at using nets too though.
• 14:51
  A lot of fishing over in Asia.
• 14:53
  Professor Fred Watson: Yes, that's right. And that's what this is.
• 14:55
  So the spacecraft lands, uh,
• 14:58
  and into a sort of framework, a huge
• 15:01
  thing that looks a bit like a bird cage,
• 15:03
  enormous, uh, but it's got a net in it.
• 15:06
  And so, uh, this thing gets caught in the
• 15:09
  net, uh, the motor switches off,
• 15:12
  uh, and it returns, uh,
• 15:15
  and is captured. So
• 15:18
  the net, they call it a net system. And we
• 15:21
  haven't really seen any detail about how this
• 15:23
  works because, uh,
• 15:27
  you know, it would be, um, it's fine
• 15:29
  catching something in a net, but then you've
• 15:31
  got to get it out the net and set it up again
• 15:33
  for another launch. With Falcon 9,
• 15:36
  it's, uh, standing there ready to be reloaded
• 15:39
  onto the launch pad.
• 15:42
  What is impressive about this, uh,
• 15:45
  capture of the booster though, and it's along
• 15:47
  March 10th B, I think.
• 15:49
  Andrew Dunkley: Yes, it is.
• 15:51
  Professor Fred Watson: Uh, this has been, as with
• 15:54
  SpaceX, uh, it's a maritime
• 15:57
  landing. So the rocket comes down to a
• 16:00
  barge basically in the ocean that's equipped
• 16:02
  with this net. Rather than just a platform
• 16:04
  which both Blue Origin and
• 16:06
  SpaceX use, they just have a platform for
• 16:09
  their returning booster rockets. Uh, but
• 16:12
  this net is a platform, but
• 16:14
  with a sort of tower attached to it,
• 16:18
  um, really quite remarkable. Uh, and, uh,
• 16:21
  uh, yes, a step forward. This is clearly
• 16:23
  going to, uh, enhance the rate at which,
• 16:26
  uh, Chinese, um, spacecraft are
• 16:29
  launched. So we'll see probably much more of
• 16:31
  it in the future.
• 16:32
  Andrew Dunkley: Yes, and look, you've got to give them a lot
• 16:34
  of credit. China has got just
• 16:37
  burst ahead in leaps and bounds when it comes
• 16:40
  to, uh, the space race and space technology.
• 16:43
  They've got their little rover on the dark
• 16:45
  side of the moon, and um, they've got their
• 16:48
  space station up there, which we've mentioned
• 16:50
  in the last few weeks is being expanded.
• 16:53
  And now they've managed to um, do something
• 16:56
  that only a few have done before and that is
• 16:58
  to return a booster, uh, down onto a floating
• 17:01
  platform, and who knows what
• 17:04
  they'll achieve next. They're just, they're
• 17:07
  quite a remarkable entity when it comes to
• 17:09
  the, um, the space. I call
• 17:12
  it the space race. I don't really like that.
• 17:14
  No, but it is. I mean, look, look,
• 17:17
  look, look what's happening with the, the
• 17:19
  push to get people back on the moon. China's
• 17:22
  well into that race and the Americans are
• 17:26
  fighting very hard to get people back there
• 17:28
  with the Artemis missions.
• 17:29
  Professor Fred Watson: Yep.
• 17:30
  Andrew Dunkley: Um, so it's no holds
• 17:33
  barred at the moment. Thought you'd find this
• 17:35
  interesting, Fred. Remember the, um, floating
• 17:37
  platforms that SpaceX used to um,
• 17:41
  land their rockets? Um, they all had really
• 17:44
  funny names. They do.
• 17:44
  Professor Fred Watson: That's right.
• 17:45
  Andrew Dunkley: Of course, I Still love you was one of them.
• 17:47
  Professor Fred Watson: I think that was the first.
• 17:49
  Andrew Dunkley: Just read the instructions. That was off
• 17:52
  the Florida, um, coast. Uh, the first one I
• 17:54
  mentioned was in the Pacific and a shortfall
• 17:57
  of gravitas, which is also an
• 18:00
  East Coast Atlantic operation. So what do you
• 18:03
  think the Chinese have called?
• 18:05
  Professor Fred Watson: Ah, I don't have that information
• 18:08
  and I'm not sure I want to guess.
• 18:11
  Andrew Dunkley: Ling Hang Shu, which uh, stands for
• 18:14
  navigator.
• 18:15
  Professor Fred Watson: Yeah, it's nice.
• 18:16
  Andrew Dunkley: Call it navigator.
• 18:17
  Professor Fred Watson: Yes, I like that. Nice.
• 18:19
  Andrew Dunkley: It's pretty good. Um, I,
• 18:22
  I wouldn't have thought they'd have gone too
• 18:24
  far outside the, the limits of
• 18:26
  normality in terms of a name. They would.
• 18:29
  That's, that's a particular Elon Musk thing,
• 18:32
  Professor Fred Watson: I think it is. Uh, that's certainly true. And
• 18:34
  Norma, um, uh, a lot of Chinese
• 18:38
  names, uh, in terms of their spacecraft and
• 18:41
  things like that have got names that come
• 18:42
  from Chinese mythology.
• 18:45
  Um, ah,
• 18:48
  there's the relay, um,
• 18:51
  spacecraft that communicates both with the
• 18:54
  Earth and uh, the lander on the far side
• 18:57
  of the moon. I think it translates as Magpie
• 19:00
  Bridge, uh, which is, uh. I can't remember
• 19:03
  what the name is, but I think it's translates
• 19:05
  as Magpie Bridge, which comes from a Chinese
• 19:08
  folk tale of some sort. It's lovely.
• 19:10
  Andrew Dunkley: Yeah.
• 19:10
  Professor Fred Watson: Ah, yeah.
• 19:11
  Andrew Dunkley: Um, I can't wait to see what they do next.
• 19:15
  No, no. And, and this actual
• 19:18
  success the Chinese have, um,
• 19:20
  demonstrated has started a lot of chatter
• 19:22
  between people about, um, you know, where
• 19:25
  things are at between the United States and
• 19:27
  China in space. So, uh, it is
• 19:30
  noticed. It's not something that, um,
• 19:33
  is being ignored in the United States, but,
• 19:36
  um, it is being noticed most definitely.
• 19:38
  Professor Fred Watson: Yeah.
• 19:39
  Andrew Dunkley: And look, they've made history. This one will
• 19:41
  be remembered because, um, it's their first,
• 19:44
  um, success at this level. I Think they've
• 19:46
  had sort of um, a few rockets that have been
• 19:49
  partially recovered. I don't know what that
• 19:51
  means exactly but uh, this
• 19:54
  is, this is like a self landing situation.
• 19:57
  Uh, and it worked very, very well. Uh, you
• 20:00
  can read all about it@the
• 20:02
  space.com website. Uh, you're
• 20:05
  listening to Space Nuts with Andrew Dunkley
• 20:08
  and Professor Fred Watson.
• 20:12
  Professor Fred Watson: Roger, your labs are here.
• 20:13
  Andrew Dunkley: Also Space Nuts.
• 20:15
  Now Fred, uh, we come to
• 20:18
  a rather saucy story, this one.
• 20:21
  Uh, and look, I
• 20:23
  even um, in reading the article
• 20:26
  noticed that they did a little preamble
• 20:29
  uh, @space.com before they ran
• 20:32
  the story. It says we approach this topic
• 20:35
  with the same rigor we apply in our
• 20:37
  respective scientific fields and we hope to
• 20:40
  provide an unbiased analysis
• 20:43
  of this topic. We hope do.
• 20:46
  Um, I think they did a pretty good job. But
• 20:48
  what we're talking about is um, a White
• 20:51
  House group that has been formed to
• 20:54
  study Ah, UAPs,
• 20:57
  unidentified anomalous phenomena
• 21:00
  formerly known as UFOs,
• 21:02
  unidentified flying objects. And I
• 21:05
  asked at the beginning of the show who's in
• 21:07
  charge? Would you care to
• 21:10
  reveal that?
• 21:11
  Professor Fred Watson: Fred? It is, yes, it's our old friend Avi
• 21:14
  Loeb who is the um,
• 21:16
  Harvard uh, astronomer, a very
• 21:19
  senior astronomer, very well thought of in
• 21:21
  the world of astrophysics. Except when he
• 21:24
  talks about UFOs. Uh,
• 21:27
  uh, he has, he's the person who's you know,
• 21:30
  looked at things like uh, does
• 21:33
  Comet uh 3i Atlas have uh,
• 21:36
  Windows or anything that might tell you that
• 21:38
  it is not a natural object, that it is
• 21:41
  artificially made. That's the interstellar
• 21:42
  comet that's flying through the solar system
• 21:45
  at the moment. It is a comet, um, and um, um,
• 21:48
  not a piece of alien hardware but.
• 21:51
  Andrew Dunkley: And yet Fred, I've had people come up to me
• 21:53
  and say oh did you hear about that comet?
• 21:57
  They think it's a spaceship. And I go no it's
• 21:59
  not.
• 22:00
  Professor Fred Watson: Yeah, only
• 22:03
  one person does.
• 22:05
  Andrew Dunkley: And that's okay, that's okay. But it's
• 22:08
  the popular press as I like to call them
• 22:11
  that fuel this stuff.
• 22:14
  Professor Fred Watson: Uh, that's right, it is. Um,
• 22:17
  so there have been moves
• 22:20
  to certainly with the freedom of information
• 22:23
  stuff that we've seen. Uh, the idea
• 22:26
  of these unidentified uh,
• 22:29
  ah, anomalous phenomena uh, are
• 22:32
  now very much in the mainstream because we've
• 22:35
  got footage taken with infrared cameras from
• 22:38
  aircraft and things of that sort. That's
• 22:40
  right.
• 22:40
  Andrew Dunkley: And we did do um, a story on
• 22:43
  it probably last couple of
• 22:46
  years, maybe longer where NASA really looked
• 22:48
  into this and admitted that look, we can't
• 22:51
  explain Everything.
• 22:52
  Professor Fred Watson: We can't.
• 22:53
  Andrew Dunkley: Yeah, something's going on. We just don't
• 22:55
  know what it is.
• 22:55
  Professor Fred Watson: That's right.
• 22:56
  Andrew Dunkley: They're not saying they're from outer space
• 22:58
  though.
• 22:58
  Professor Fred Watson: That's correct. There's no evidence that
• 23:00
  they're of alien origin.
• 23:04
  Um, which suggests they're either natural
• 23:06
  phenomena or somebody's doing stuff that the
• 23:08
  US military doesn't know about.
• 23:11
  Andrew Dunkley: And I'd put it in that basket.
• 23:13
  Professor Fred Watson: Yes, I think that's probably it. Um,
• 23:17
  so, uh, this council,
• 23:20
  um, it's a new body, uh,
• 23:24
  that is now being chaired by Avilaeb. It's
• 23:27
  called the UAP Science Advisory Council. And
• 23:30
  that I think is a good name because it
• 23:33
  tells uh, you that we're looking at the
• 23:34
  science, not the fiction. Um,
• 23:37
  and I, uh, think it's brought together
• 23:40
  quite a large group of, uh,
• 23:43
  experts. I looked down the list, uh, of
• 23:46
  people. Um, it's a, a big council. Not,
• 23:49
  you know, not two or three people. There's
• 23:51
  about 20, I think, probably altogether.
• 23:53
  Um, it's. And these are people who
• 23:56
  come from very different backgrounds.
• 23:58
  Computer scientists, psychologists,
• 24:01
  military people, a retired Navy admiral,
• 24:04
  um, an economist,
• 24:07
  lots and lots of physicists of
• 24:10
  course, as well, um, biosciences,
• 24:13
  a vast array of different disciplines
• 24:16
  which is going to essentially,
• 24:20
  uh, look at the
• 24:23
  evidence, I suppose, and where that might
• 24:25
  lead. Now with Avi Loeb in
• 24:27
  charge, you
• 24:30
  might naturally think, and this may be true,
• 24:33
  that he would lean towards always the
• 24:36
  more sensational, uh, end
• 24:39
  of the explanations. Um,
• 24:41
  maybe he will, maybe he'll
• 24:45
  perhaps, um, resist those
• 24:47
  temptations. His point has always been
• 24:51
  that, uh, unless you think outside the box,
• 24:53
  we're never going to discover anything really
• 24:55
  unusual and really interesting. And yes, I
• 24:58
  think most scientists applaud that. But it's
• 25:01
  the sensationalism that is built around
• 25:04
  some of his ideas that uh, some
• 25:07
  scientists object to quite strongly. I've
• 25:09
  heard people really say, you know,
• 25:11
  fairly damning things about Avi Loeb
• 25:14
  because he's profited by it. He's written
• 25:17
  books that sensationalize some of the ideas
• 25:20
  of UAPs. Uh, so
• 25:23
  we'll have to see how that goes. But I
• 25:25
  thought it was a very intriguing news item.
• 25:27
  It means, uh, the Pentagon, I think,
• 25:30
  uh, well, it's actually the White House
• 25:32
  that's uh, started this. But the Pentagon is
• 25:34
  certainly involved. Their taking
• 25:37
  things a step further in regard to
• 25:40
  trying to sort out what unidentified
• 25:43
  anomalistic phenomena, uh, are.
• 25:45
  Andrew Dunkley: I think we'd all like to know.
• 25:47
  Professor Fred Watson: We would all like to know exactly.
• 25:48
  Andrew Dunkley: Jokes aside, something's going on
• 25:51
  out there and they are seeing things
• 25:54
  that defy
• 25:57
  normality when it comes to
• 26:00
  ability and speed. And like these things
• 26:03
  can, can travel at speeds that
• 26:06
  are unthinkable and maneuver uh,
• 26:09
  in ways that a standard aircraft could not
• 26:11
  achieve. Like uh, we don't know why,
• 26:14
  we don't know what they are, we don't know
• 26:16
  who's doing it. And it's not every single one
• 26:19
  they've seen. A lot of these things are
• 26:20
  explainable.
• 26:21
  Professor Fred Watson: Yes.
• 26:22
  Andrew Dunkley: Reminds me of a doco I saw many, many years
• 26:25
  ago of a witness.
• 26:28
  Um, uh, like they took footage
• 26:31
  of a UFO flying across a mountain
• 26:34
  range in the United States
• 26:37
  and it just looked like your classic
• 26:40
  cigar shaped um, thing
• 26:42
  with portals on the side moving
• 26:45
  across the horizon and
• 26:48
  you'd naturally go, that's a flying saucer.
• 26:51
  But when they analyzed it they realized that
• 26:54
  because of the circumstances in the
• 26:56
  atmosphere at that time, a lot of the detail
• 26:59
  of the object was obscured.
• 27:01
  Professor Fred Watson: Yes.
• 27:01
  Andrew Dunkley: And what you were actually seeing was just
• 27:03
  the cabin of a light aircraft.
• 27:09
  You got to take it all with a grain of salt
• 27:12
  or whatever, um, because uh,
• 27:15
  most of these things can be explained. And I
• 27:18
  also suggest that a lot of the ones that
• 27:20
  can't be explained are probably quite natural
• 27:22
  or normal or man made.
• 27:25
  Professor Fred Watson: Yes.
• 27:25
  Andrew Dunkley: These handful of things that they've been
• 27:28
  seeing, um, particularly off the coast of the
• 27:31
  United States defy
• 27:33
  logic. And that's probably
• 27:36
  what this group is all about trying to figure
• 27:38
  this out.
• 27:41
  Professor Fred Watson: Um, the article that you mentioned that
• 27:44
  we're Talking about from Space.com, i think,
• 27:46
  is that right? Space.com?
• 27:47
  Andrew Dunkley: yes it is.
• 27:49
  Professor Fred Watson: Also, uh, includes um, a rather
• 27:52
  nice graphic which has come from the
• 27:55
  Pentagon. It's Pentagon's all Domain
• 27:58
  Anomaly Resolution Office. Uh,
• 28:01
  and what they've done is they've
• 28:03
  collected these
• 28:05
  um, UAP reports or UFO reports
• 28:08
  as we used to call them from 1996 to
• 28:11
  2023. That's a fair number of
• 28:14
  years. Uh, and they've done basically a
• 28:17
  statistical analysis on them. And so um,
• 28:20
  there's you know, a bar
• 28:23
  chart that shows how, what sort
• 28:26
  of altitude these objects are reported at and
• 28:29
  it's typically about 20,000 Fe,
• 28:32
  uh, a bit less than what most commercial
• 28:35
  jets fly at, uh, 20,000 to
• 28:38
  25,000ft. Um, but also
• 28:42
  there are, you know, basically what we call
• 28:45
  the morphology, the shape of these things.
• 28:47
  There's a breakdown of that and m, uh, almost
• 28:50
  half of them are spherical, uh, some sort of
• 28:52
  sphere. And that actually kind of
• 28:55
  suggests to me something natural because
• 28:58
  a lot of things turn spherical in nature.
• 29:01
  Yeah, um, but there's also
• 29:04
  uh, typical Characteristics. And
• 29:07
  what I thought was most interesting was a map
• 29:10
  of the world that's got the
• 29:12
  reported UAP hotspots on it. And
• 29:15
  they are the east and west coast of the usa,
• 29:18
  um, a lot in the Persian
• 29:21
  Gulf region. That's a hot spot at the moment.
• 29:24
  Yes, very interesting. And also
• 29:27
  in uh, Northern China. And um,
• 29:30
  these are ah, sort of mid latitudes. Just a
• 29:32
  strip of them in the Northern hemisphere.
• 29:35
  Nothing pretty well anywhere else. I mean
• 29:38
  there are thought to be things that
• 29:41
  might be called hotspots where people think
• 29:42
  they've seen something in other parts of the
• 29:44
  world. But these reported UAP hotspots
• 29:47
  are very much in those middle latitudes in
• 29:49
  the northern hemisphere.
• 29:51
  Andrew Dunkley: Yeah.
• 29:52
  Professor Fred Watson: What does that mean?
• 29:53
  Andrew Dunkley: Well, it could mean two things. They
• 29:56
  are there for a specific reason because of
• 30:00
  the um, target areas, or
• 30:03
  we're just not seeing them in other places
• 30:05
  because it's not as heavily monitored.
• 30:06
  Professor Fred Watson: Yes, a selection effect could be
• 30:09
  true. Could be either of those. So anyway,
• 30:11
  we, you know, notwithstanding all that, uh,
• 30:14
  we await with interest to see what
• 30:17
  the deliberations of this new council are,
• 30:19
  uh, and whether they come up with anything
• 30:21
  concrete that we can say about these UAPs.
• 30:25
  Andrew Dunkley: Yes, well, uh, hopefully they'll come up with
• 30:27
  something concrete, although they're probably
• 30:29
  not made of concrete. But I gotta say
• 30:32
  at the bottom of the uh, Space.com article
• 30:34
  there's some um, comments from readers and
• 30:37
  um, I love some of the thoughts.
• 30:40
  Uh, one person says UFO chatter is
• 30:43
  finally getting a serious data driven
• 30:45
  treatment. Um, someone else says given
• 30:48
  Loeb's track record, how could he possibly
• 30:51
  keep it rigorous? Uh, someone else says good
• 30:53
  luck to Professor Loeb and his highly
• 30:54
  esteemed team of professional men and women.
• 30:57
  My favorite though is this one.
• 30:59
  Guess the Ghostbusters were unavailable.
• 31:04
  Yes, that's uh. I love it. I love
• 31:07
  it.
• 31:07
  Professor Fred Watson: There you go.
• 31:08
  Andrew Dunkley: People are awesome.
• 31:10
  Professor Fred Watson: They are.
• 31:11
  Andrew Dunkley: They just come up with some really good lines
• 31:12
  sometimes. If, uh, you want to read all about
• 31:15
  that new group, it's probably all over the
• 31:17
  Internet everywhere. But uh, Space.com has
• 31:19
  done a very, very good article on it with all
• 31:21
  the bells and whistles and I think we're just
• 31:24
  about done. Fred, thank you very much.
• 31:26
  Professor Fred Watson: Well, that went very quickly, Andrew. Maybe
• 31:29
  it's just that we're both losing it and it's
• 31:32
  time's passing without us knowing.
• 31:34
  Andrew Dunkley: Indeed. Catch you very soon though.
• 31:36
  Professor Fred Watson: I hope so. Look forward to it.
• 31:38
  Cheers.
• 31:38
  Andrew Dunkley: For now, Professor Fred Watson, Astronomer at
• 31:41
  large. And don't forget to visit our website
• 31:42
  in between episodes and check it out. Uh,
• 31:45
  there's plenty to see and do. Of course, all
• 31:47
  our episodes are there. You can also send us
• 31:49
  messages or questions via the Ask Me Anything
• 31:52
  tab. At the top, it's labeled AMA M.
• 31:55
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• 31:57
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• 32:00
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• 32:03
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• 32:06
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• 32:09
  And we don't ask that you do that. It's not
• 32:11
  mandatory, but if you're interested, you can
• 32:14
  certainly go and have a look. And thanks to
• 32:16
  Huw in the studio who can't be with us today.
• 32:18
  He got a phone call from Abby Loeb asking
• 32:21
  strange questions about his very odd car.
• 32:24
  And from me, Andrew Dunkley. Thanks for your
• 32:26
  company. We'll see you on the next episode of
• 32:28
  Space Nuts. Coming soon.
• 32:29
  Professor Fred Watson: Soon.
• 32:29
  Andrew Dunkley: Bye.
• 32:29
  Professor Fred Watson: Bye.
• 32:30
  Andrew Dunkley: Uh, you've been listening to the Space Nuts
• 32:33
  podcast, available at
• 32:36
  Apple Podcasts, Spotify,
• 32:38
  iHeartRadio or your favorite podcast
• 32:41
  player. You can also stream on
• 32:43
  demand@bytes.um.com.
• 32:45
  Professor Fred Watson: this has been another quality podcast
• 32:47
  production from bytes.com.