Black Hole Stars Confirmed, Universe Collapse Timeline & Falcon Heavy Returns

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Anna: Welcome back to Astronomy Daily. I'm

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Anna.

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Avery: And I'm Avery. And, um, Anna, can I just say

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it is so good to be back on air.

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Anna: It really is. We've had a short break in

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production, but space, space did not

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take a break. In fact, the cosmos has been

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absolutely firing this week and we have got

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a packed episode to prove it.

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Avery: We are talking black hole stars. Finally

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confirmed a rocket that hasn't flown in a

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year and a half. Roaring back to life, the

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next generation of space exploration hardware

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arriving at Kennedy. And oh, uh, just a

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small update about the eventual fate of the

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entire universe.

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Anna: No big deal, just the end of everything.

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Avery: We'll also have some gorgeous sky watching

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news for our Southern Hemisphere listeners.

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A, uh, meteor shower is peaking in just days

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and it is a good one.

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Anna: This is astronomy Daily Season 5,

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Episode 93, and we are absolutely

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delighted to be back. Let's get into it.

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Avery: Alright, we are starting with what might

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honestly be the biggest cosmological story of

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2026 so far. It concerns those

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mysterious little red dots that James Webb

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has been teasing us with for the past couple

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of years. And this week, NASA's

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Chandra X Ray Observatory may have finally

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cracked the case

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Anna: for anyone who needs a quick refresher. Ever

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since Webb started its deep sky observations,

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it kept finding these strange compact

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ruby red objects scattered across the early

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universe. They existed when the cosmos was

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only a few hundred million years old. They

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were too massive to be ordinary galaxies, but

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they weren't behaving like the supermassive

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black holes we know either.

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Avery: And critically, they weren't emitting X rays,

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which is really weird because actively

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feeding black holes almost always do.

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So what were they?

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Anna: Well, this week, Chandra found an X ray

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signal that lines up exactly precisely

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with the position of one of Webb's little red

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dots. The object, cataloged as

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3DHST, age

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12014, had been sitting in

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Chandra's database for years. But it only

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became significant when Webb imaged the same

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patch of sky and found a little red dot in

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exactly the same spot.

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Avery: And that X ray energy, it matches the

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signature of a quasar, a galaxy powered by

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an extremely active black hole. This is the

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first little red dot ever observed in X rays.

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And it gives astronomers their strongest

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evidence yet for what these things actually

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are.

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Anna: So the leading theory which is gaining

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serious momentum now is that little red

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dots are so called black hole stars.

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Picture a dense cloud of gas perhaps a

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few hundred light years across, with a

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growing supermassive black hole eating it

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from the inside out. The heat from that

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infalling material glows not as X

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rays, which get absorbed by the surrounding

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cloud, but as visible red light, which is

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exactly what Webb sees.

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Avery: It's a completely new class of cosmic object.

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Not quite a star, not quite a galaxy,

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something in between. An early universe

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state we've never directly observed before.

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Anna: And if this interpretation holds, it helps

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solve one of the biggest puzzles in modern

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cosmology. How did supermassive black

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holes get so enormous so fast?

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The answer, it seems, is that they grew

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inside these massive gas cocoons hidden

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from our instruments, consuming their birth

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clouds from within.

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Avery: One astronomer told Scientific American, and

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I love this quote, lrds once seemed to

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demand either impossibly efficient galaxy

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formation or implausibly massive black

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holes appearing out of nowhere. Either way,

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something was badly wrong with our models.

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But now the pieces are fitting together.

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Anna: More X ray follow up and more Webb spectra

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are needed to confirm the picture fully. But

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the community is buzzing. These objects may

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be Webb's single most consequential

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discovery.

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Avery: Yet the universe really does reward

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patience. Sometimes you just have to wait for

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the right telescope to look in the right

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direction.

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Anna: Now, for our regular listeners, you'll know

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we've been following the Artemis story

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closely across this entire season.

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Artemis 2, launched on April 1, took

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four astronauts on a breathtaking journey

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around the far side of the moon and splashed

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down safely on April 10th. And this week

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there were two remarkable developments

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happening almost simultaneously at the

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very same spaceport.

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Avery: It really was a full circle moment in Kennedy

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space Center on April 28th. On one side of

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the facility, the Orion capsule named

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Integrity, the very spacecraft that carried

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Wiseman, Glover, Koch and Hanson

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around the moon, arrived back home for post

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flight analysis.

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Anna: Engineers are now in the process of

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deservicing integrity, removing

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payloads, extracting avionics boxes for

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reuse, and conducting detailed scans of the

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heat shield and other systems. Every piece of

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data they recover will directly inform

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Artemis 3.

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Avery: And at the very same time, on the other side

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of Kennedy, the core Stage for Artemis 3

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Space Launch System rocket was being

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offloaded from NASA's Pegasus barge and

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moved into the vehicle assembly building.

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That core stage, the largest structural

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component of the rocket, had been

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manufactured at NASA's Michaux Assembly

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Facility in New Orleans and shipped 900

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miles by sea.

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Anna: At 212ft tall when fully

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assembled, the SLS core stage is an

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engineering marvel in its own right. It

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houses two propellant tanks holding over

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733,000 gallons of

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super chilled liquid propellant, enough to

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power four RS25 engines for more than

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eight minutes of flight.

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Avery: And this marks a first for the program. For

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Artemis 1 and 2. The entire core stage

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was assembled at Michaud before shipping.

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Starting with Artemis 3, NASA and Boeing

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are splitting production, outfitting major

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sections individually and joining them at

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Kennedy. It's a streamlining of the

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manufacturing process designed to accelerate

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the cadence of Future missions.

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Anna: Artemis 3 is currently scheduled for launch

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in 2027, and it'll take astronauts to

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Earth orbit to test rendezvous and docking

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with commercial spacecraft, the critical step

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needed before Artemis 4 can actually

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land humans on the lunar surface in

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2028.

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Avery: The pace of this program right now is

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genuinely impressive. Artemis 2 just came

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home and already the next mission's rocket is

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being assembled. That's how you build

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momentum.

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Anna: Now let's talk about a rocket comeback,

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because on April 29, SpaceX's

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Falcon Heavy roared back to life for the

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first time in 18 months and it did

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not disappoint.

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Avery: 18 months for a rocket of that

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capability, that is a long time between

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flights. The last Falcon Heavy mission was in

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October 2024, when it launched NASA's

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Europa Clipper toward Jupiter. And now it's

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back.

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Anna: The mission was Viasat 3F3,

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the third and final satellite in Viasat's

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constellation of high capacity broadband

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relay stations. This 6.6

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ton spacecraft is headed for

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geostationary orbit where it will serve

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the Asia Pacific region with more than 1

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terabit per second of Internet capacity.

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It completes a, uh, constellation that ViaSat

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has been building for over a decade

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Avery: and Falcon Heavy delivered in spectacular

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fashion. Liftoff was at 10:13am M

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Eastern Time from Launch Complex 39A at

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AH, Kennedy Space Center. The very same

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historic pad that launched the Apollo

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missions. And the rocket's 27 Merlin

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engines generated 5.1 million

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pounds of thrust at liftoff. The sight of

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that thing climbing into the Florida sky is

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always extraordinary.

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Anna: But perhaps the most crowd pleasing moment

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came about eight minutes after launch when

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the two side boosters, veterans of previous

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flightsexecuted simultaneous

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touchdowns back at Cape Canaveral Space Force

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Station. Those twin sonic booms,

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those two columns of fire landing in

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perfect formation. It never gets old.

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Avery: The central core booster was not recovered on

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this mission. It was expended as planned and

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came down in the Atlantic. But with two

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reusable side boosters safely home and the

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satellite deployed successfully a few hours

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after launch, it was mission accomplished.

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Anna: This was the 12th flight of a Falcon Heavy

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since its debut in 2018. While

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Falcon Heavy doesn't fly as often as its

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Falcon 9 sibling, in a way it's a victim of

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the Falcon 9's incredible versatility. When

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it does fly, it's always an event. And for

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viasat, it was the completion of something

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they've been working toward for more than 10

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years.

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Avery: The Viasat 3 program has had its share of

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challenges. The first satellite had an

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antenna deployment issue that crippled most

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of its capability. But the constellation is

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now complete, and viasat is looking ahead.

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Welcome back, Falcon Heavy.

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Anna: Alright, now for what might be the most mind

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bending story of the week. How comfortable

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are you with the concept of the universe

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ending?

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Avery: Oh, extremely comfortable. It's fine.

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Everything is fine, right?

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Anna: Because a new cosmological study has just

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suggested that the universe may be on a much

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tighter schedule than we previously thought.

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We're talking a potential Big Crunch, a total

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cosmic collapse in just

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33.3 billion years.

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Avery: Now, to be clear, that is still an, um,

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almost incomprehensibly long time.

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The universe is currently about 13.8 billion

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years old. We're talking about more than

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twice that again before anything dramatic

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happens. But in cosmological terms,

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this represents a serious revision.

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Anna: Up until recently, the dominant view was that

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the universe would expand forever, driven by

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dark energy, that mysterious force which

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makes up about 70% of the universe's

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total energy content. Galaxies would

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drift further and further apart over

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trillions of years, leaving a cold,

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dark, empty cosmos.

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Avery: But this new research, published this week

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and using real observational data from two of

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the world's most powerful cosmic surveys, the

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Dark Energy Survey and the Dark Energy

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Spectrum Microscopic Instrument, introduces a

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different possibility.

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Anna: The key is something called the Axion Dark

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Energy Model. It's a hybrid theory that

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treats dark energy not as a fixed constant,

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but as, uh, something that can evolve over

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time, specifically as a combination of the

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cosmological constant and an ultralight

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particle called an axion, which is usually

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associated with dark matter research.

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Avery: And when researchers tested this model

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against real galaxy survey data, we're

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talking maps of hundreds of millions of

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galaxies. It fit remarkably well.

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More importantly, it predicts a future phase

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where the combined effects of this axion

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field begin to pull the universe inward

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rather than push it outward.

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Anna: Though instead of eternal expansion, you get

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a universe that reaches a maximum size,

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slows, stops, and then begins to contract.

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Over billions of years, galaxies that are

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currently racing apart would begin to draw

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closer, cosmic structures would compress,

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temperatures would rise, and ultimately

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everything would collapse back into an ultra

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dense state. A big crunch mirroring

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the conditions of the Big Bang in reverse.

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Avery: There's even speculation that such a collapse

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could trigger another cosmic cycle, a new

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Big Bang from The wreckage of the old

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universe, which is either terrifying or

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poetic, depending on your perspective.

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Anna: Now, it's important to say this is one model

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among several. The fate of the universe is

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genuinely one of the open frontiers of

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cosmology. But what makes this significant is

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that it's grounded in actual observational

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data, not just theory. And it highlights

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just how much the behavior of dark energy

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matters. Even small changes in how it

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acts over time lead to completely different

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ultimate destinies for the cosmos.

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Avery: It also gives us a really compelling reason

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to build the next generation of space

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observatories, including, as we covered

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recently, the Roman Space Telescope launching

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in September. More data, better models,

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clearer picture of what actually awaits

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everything that exists.

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Anna: For now, enjoy the stars. You've got

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33 billion years and change.

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Avery: Plenty of time.

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Anna: As we mentioned earlier, Artemis 2's

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Orion capsule is now back at Kennedy Space

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Center. And while engineers are thrilled with

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the overall success of that mission, 10 days

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in space, humans around the moon for the

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first time in over 50 years. Years. It

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wouldn't be a test flight without some things

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to learn from.

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Avery: And mission managers have been admirably

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transparent about what they found. Following

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Splashdown on April 10, several issues were

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flagged for investigation, and NASA's post

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mission briefings have given us a clear

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picture of what comes next.

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Anna: The big one everyone's watching is the Orion

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heat shield, made from a material called

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avcot, the same ablative UH material used

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in the Apollo era. The shield performed well

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during the fiery re entry at nearly

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24,000 miles per hour, but there

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were expected signs of divots and, um,

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cracking in the material.

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Avery: This was anticipated. The heat Shield's

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behavior during re entry has been a known

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discussion point since Artemis 1. What's

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different now is that engineers have real

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world performance data to analyze, including

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detailed scans and imagery from aircraft that

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track the capsule during reentry. The data is

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now being processed at Kennedy.

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Anna: Beyond the heat shield, mission managers

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identified a, uh, valve in Orion's service

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module that requires a redesign. And in

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perhaps the most relatable moment of the

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entire post mission debrief, there was a

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toilet issue that needs to be sorted out for

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future long duration missions.

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Avery: To his credit, Artemis 2 commander Reid

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Weissman has defended the mission's

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facilities, saying, and this is a real quote,

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that was a wonderful toilet, so make of that

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what you will.

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Anna: NASA's Associate Administrator for human

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spaceflight acknowledged that these issues

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represent a tight Turnaround for Artemis 3,

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scheduled for 2027. But

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importantly, the agency says it is learning

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to move faster and the overall vehicle

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performance was strong.

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Avery: The design changes for the heat shield will

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be implemented for Artemis 3. The AFCO

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permeability issues that caused the erosion

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pattern are understood, and the revised

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design is already in development. These are

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the growing pains of a new crewed lunar

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program, and NASA is working through them

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systematically.

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Anna: The key takeaway Artemis II achieved

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all its primary mission objectives. The crew

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came home safely, and the data collected is

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now directly shaping the next mission. That

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is exactly how test flights are supposed to

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work.

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Avery: And now for something you can actually go

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outside and experience yourself. Because one

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of the best meteor showers of the year is

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peaking in just a matter of days, we're

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talking about the ADA Aquariids.

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Anna: The Ada aquariids peak around May

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6, so that's just days away. And this is

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an especially exciting shower for our

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listeners in Australia, New Zealand and

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across the Southern Hemisphere. You're in the

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prime seats for this one.

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Avery: So what makes the Ada Aquarian special? These

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meteors are debris from Halley's Comet. Every

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year, Earth passes through the trail of dust

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and particles that Halley left behind on its

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journeys through the inner solar system.

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Those particles, some, um, no bigger than a

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grain of sand, slam into our atmosphere at

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about 40 miles per hour and burn up in

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brilliant streaks of light.

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Anna: Halley's Comet last passed through the inner

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solar system in 1986 and won't

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return until 2061. But every

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year we get to pass through its legacy, and

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the Eta Aquarids are that legacy. Made

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visible at peak, you can expect

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Avery: up to 50 meteors per hour under good

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conditions. And the Southern Hemisphere gets

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significantly more activity than the north

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because the Radian Point in the constellation

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Aquarius sits higher in the southern sky.

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Anna: The best time to look is in the hours before

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dawn, roughly between 3am and

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first light. Get away from city lights if you

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can. Let your eyes adjust to the dark for

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about 20 minutes and look toward the

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northeast. No telescope needed. This is a

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naked eye event.

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Avery: One thing to note, this year, the Moon may

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throw some light into the sky in your peak,

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which can wash out the fainter meteors. But

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even so, the brighter Eta Aquarids,

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particularly those long, graceful streaks

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that leave glowing trains across the sky,

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should be spectacular.

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Anna: These fast moving meteors are famous for

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leaving persistent trains, glowing trails

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that can linger for several seconds after the

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meteor itself has gone. They are some of the

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most photogenic meteors you'll see all

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year.

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Avery: So Southern Hemisphere friends set that

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alarm, grab a blanket and a thermos of

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something warm and go say hello to the Ghost

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of Halley's Comet. It's waiting for you.

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Anna: What a week to come.

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Back to Black Hole, stars, Moon rockets,

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Falcon Heavy, the potential end of the

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universe. Honestly, space is just

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never boring.

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Avery: Never boring. Anna. Uh, never boring. Thank

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you so much for joining us for season five,

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episode 93 of Astronomy Daily. It's

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wonderful to be back.

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Anna: If you want to go deeper on any of today's

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00:17:54.890 --> 00:17:56.810
stories or check back through our archive

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00:17:56.810 --> 00:17:58.810
from across the season, you can find

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00:17:58.890 --> 00:18:01.530
everything@astronomydaily.IO

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00:18:01.990 --> 00:18:04.070
and if you're enjoying the show, please do

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00:18:04.070 --> 00:18:06.350
leave us a review or subscribe. Wherever you

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00:18:06.350 --> 00:18:08.870
get your podcasts, it genuinely makes a

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00:18:08.870 --> 00:18:09.270
difference.

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Avery: You can also find us on social media

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00:18:12.390 --> 00:18:15.230
strodaily pod and we'd love to hear from you

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if you go out and catch the ida, uh, Aquarids

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00:18:17.230 --> 00:18:19.590
this week. Share your meteor photos. Tell us

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what you saw.

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Anna: Until next time, keep looking up Clear

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skies, everyone.

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Avery: This has been Astronomy Daily.

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00:18:26.390 --> 00:18:27.910
Astronomy Daily

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00:18:29.510 --> 00:18:32.040
stories we told you.

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Love.