Launch Eve: Starship V3 Ready for Liftoff | Lunar Laser Navigation Breakthrough | VAST Ventures into Satellites

WEBVTT

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Anna: The world's most powerful rocket is on the

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launch pad and it's launching tomorrow. We

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have the full Update on Starship V3 and

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the bittersweet shadow hanging over the

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launch site.

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Avery: In the cold darkness of the Moon's south

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pole, scientists want to build the most

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precise navigation system ever created.

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Lasers and craters permanently

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frozen in shadow.

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Anna: A, uh, space startup you might know best for

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its space station ambitions just revealed a

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surprise new business. Astronomy Daily

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Season 5 Episode 107 let's go.

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Avery: Ready when you are.

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Anna: It's launch eve for the most anticipated

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rocket test of 2026. SpaceX's

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Starship V3, the biggest, most

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powerful rocket ever built, is on the pad at

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Starbase in South Texas. Confirmed go for

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launch Thursday, May 21st.

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Avery: We've been following this one for a few days

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now, Anna, and this is genuinely the launch

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where the stakes couldn't be higher for NASA,

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for SpaceX, for the whole future of deep

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space travel.

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Anna: Let's run through what's happening and why it

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matters. The launch window opens at

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6:30pm Eastern Time on Thursday.

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That's 8:30 Friday morning for listeners in

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Australia and New Zealand. 90 minutes to get

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off the pad.

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Avery: This is Flight 12, the 12th Test

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of the fully stacked Starship vehicle. And

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um, the very first for the completely

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redesigned version 3 architecture. It's

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been seven months since Starship last flew

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back in October 2025, so the

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pressure has been building.

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Anna: And it's the first flight From Starbase Pad

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2, a brand new launch complex. So

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there are a lot of firsts stacked up in this

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one mission.

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Avery: What are the main test objectives for Flight

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12?

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Anna: The Booster Super Heavy will attempt a, uh,

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controlled splashdown in the Gulf of Mexico

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about seven minutes after launching. No

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Mechazilla catch attempt this time. This is a

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new vehicle and SpaceX wants clean data

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before pushing for that. Meanwhile, the upper

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stage ship 39 heads on a

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suborbital trajectory partway around the

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world.

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Avery: And it ends in the Indian Ocean, which puts

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the re entry path right over Western

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Australia. For our Southern Hemisphere

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audience, there is a real chance of a visible

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streak across the Predawn sky around

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65 minutes after launching.

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Anna: The upper stage has some fascinating

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objectives. It'll deploy 22 dummy

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Starlink satellites. Two of those are

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specially modified. They'll scan Starship's

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heat shield from outside and beam images back

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to mission controllers. That's a completely

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new capability testing how the team might

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assess heat shield readiness for future

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return to Starbase missions.

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Avery: And there's a deliberately removed heat

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shield tile to measure what happens

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aerodynamically when one is missing. Plus a

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Raptor engine relay in space and a

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structural stress maneuver on the rear flaps.

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SpaceX is loading this flight with data

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collection.

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Anna: Now, before we go further with the excitement

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and we are genuinely excited, we do need

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to acknowledge something. On 15 May, a

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worker died at the Starbase site in South

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Texas. According to reports, the person was a

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contractor who died after a fall in the early

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hours of that Friday morning OSHA is

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investigating.

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Avery: SpaceX has not publicly commented. Our

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thoughts are with the person's family and

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colleagues. It's a reminder that behind every

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spectacular launch is a workforce of

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thousands of people doing difficult,

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sometimes dangerous work that deserves

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acknowledgment.

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Anna: And there is a broader context here. A, uh,

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2025 analysis using OSHA data

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found that Starbase has a significantly

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higher worker injury rate than comparable

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aerospace facilities. That's something the

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industry and regulators need to keep in focus

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as the pace of operations accelerates.

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Avery: With that noted, the launch itself. Why does

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NASA need Starship V3 to work so

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badly?

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Anna: Because Starship is the designated lunar

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lander for Artemis 4. That's the mission that

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will actually put boots back on the moon,

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targeted for 2028. NASA

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needs SpaceX to prove Starship can get to

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orbit, refuel there, dock with an Orion

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capsule and descend to the surface. None of

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that has happened yet. This test is the

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foundation.

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Avery: B3 is also supposed to be the baseline

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vehicle for crewed missions eventually. And

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SpaceX's plans for orbital data centers,

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Mars missions, everything a lot is

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riding on a clean test tomorrow.

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Anna: The launch window opens at 6:30 Eastern

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Thursday evening. 8:30 Friday morning,

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Australian Eastern Time. SpaceX will

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livestream from about 45 minutes before

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liftoff. We'll link everything in the show

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Notes next up.

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Avery: Today, here's, um, an idea that sounds like

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science fiction, but is grounded in some very

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serious physics. What if the

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coldest, darkest, most inhospitable

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places on the Moon turned out to be the ideal

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location for one of the most precise

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instruments ever conceived?

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Anna: You're talking about the permanently shadowed

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craters near the lunar south pole.

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Avery: Exactly. Researchers at the National

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Institute of Standards and Technology

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in the US have published a proposal this

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week that's genuinely elegant. These

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polar craters never, ever receive direct

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sunlight. Because of the Moon's very low

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axial tilt, they've been in permanent

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darkness for billions of years. Temperatures

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inside reach around 16 Kelvin. That's

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minus 257 degrees Celsius,

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almost absolute zero.

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Anna: And that makes them special for lasers.

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Avery: Incredibly special. The most stable

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lasers in existence rely on silicon

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optical cavities, essentially a pair of

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ultra precise mirrors in a rigid housing.

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The problem is that even the tiniest

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temperature fluctuation or vibration will

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cause the laser frequency to drift. On Earth,

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you need enormously complex cryogenic

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cooling systems and vibration isolation

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just to keep them stable. In one of these

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lunar craters, nature provides all of that

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for free.

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Anna: The near absolute zero temperature

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eliminates thermal noise. The near perfect

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vacuum eliminates atmospheric interference.

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And the bedrock of a lunar crater is

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extraordinarily stable compared to any

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location on Earth.

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Avery: Jun Ye, the lead researcher at nist, put it

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beautifully. He said as soon as he understood

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what these permanently shadowed regions could

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offer, he he felt it would be the most ideal

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environment ever for a super stable laser.

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Anna: So what would such a laser actually be used

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for? This isn't just a cool physics

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experiment.

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Avery: Not at all. The applications are immediately

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practical for everything humanity is planning

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to do on the moon. First, navigation.

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As we build up Artemis infrastructure at the

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lunar south pole, spacecraft and landers

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currently have to rely heavily on Earth based

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tracking systems. That's slow,

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imprecise and increasingly impractical as

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lunar activity ramps up. A laser

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locked to this kind of ultra stable cavity

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could provide a GPS like timing backbone.

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A master reference signal that spacecraft,

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landers and astronauts could navigate by

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an independent

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Anna: lunar positioning system that's

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genuinely transformative for long term

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operations.

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Avery: There's more. The same laser could enable

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ultra precise distance measurements between

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satellites in lunar orbit, critical for

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mapping and coordination. It could serve as

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the first atomic clock on an extraterrestrial

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body, establishing a lunar timescale.

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And this one caught my eye. It could

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potentially support gravitational wave

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detection from the lunar surface.

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Anna: The Moon has been discussed as a future

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gravitational wave observatory site. Because

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it lacks the seismic noise that limits

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detectors on Earth, a laser like this would

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be a key component.

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Avery: This is still a proposal, but it's the kind

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of forward thinking infrastructure planning

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that needs to happen now before the crewed

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missions arrive. Because you really don't

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want to be figuring out lunar GPS after

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the astronauts are already there.

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Anna: Before moving on to our next story, a quick

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Avery: When when you can find a link to our special

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offer in the show notes, do what we did and

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get NordVPN.

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Anna: Now you might know vast as the California

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startup building haven one the commercial

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space station that launched last year as

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humanity's first privately owned orbital

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outpost. But this week, VAST made an

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announcement that raised a few eyebrows.

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They're getting into the satellite business.

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A pivot, an expansion really.

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On 19 May, Vast announced a new

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line of high power satellites distinct

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from their space station work. They're

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positioning this as a separate business line,

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entering a market currently dominated by

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established players like Boeing and Airbus in

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the geostationary orbit segment, as well as

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the emerging high throughput LEO operators.

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Avery: High power satellites. What does that mean

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specifically? Higher power than standard

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communication satellites?

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Anna: Exactly. High power satellites can

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generate significantly more electrical power

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from their solar arrays, which translates

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directly into more powerful transmitters and

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more bandwidth capacity. They're attractive

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for government customers, defense

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applications and premium commercial

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communications sectors where performance

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outweighs launch cost as a priority.

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Avery: And VAST has the manufacturing expertise from

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Haven One to draw on.

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Anna: That's presumably part of the logic. Building

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a space station requires solving very hard

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problems around long duration power systems,

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thermal management, structural integrity in

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orbitall, things that translate well into

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satellite manufacturing. Bast seems to be

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betting they can leverage that expertise into

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a new revenue stream.

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Avery: It's, um, an interesting strategic move.

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Space stations are enormously capital

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intensive with a very long return horizon.

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Satellites are a more established market with

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clearer near term revenue. It diversifies

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their business in a meaningful way.

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Anna: Haven One remains their flagship product.

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This isn't an abandonment of that vision, but

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it signals that VAST is thinking about itself

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as a broader space infrastructure company,

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not just a station operator. One to watch.

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Avery: Time now for a black hole story. When the

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James Webb Space Telescope started returning

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data from the early universe, it created a

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beautiful problem. It found black holes that

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were too big. Impossibly big by our

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models. Supermassive black holes in

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galaxies just 800 million years after

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the Big Bang. Far more massive relative to

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their host galaxies than anything we see in

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the modern universe.

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Anna: And that shouldn't be possible under our

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standard understanding of how black holes and

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galaxies co evolve.

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Avery: Right. The conventional model says black

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holes and galaxies grow together in a kind

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of feedback loop. Star formation, gas

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accretion, they regulate each other. The

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ratio of black hole mass to galaxy mass is

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fairly consistent in the local universe,

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around a, uh, tenth to half a percent. But

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JWST kept finding early galaxies where

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the black hole was grotesquely oversized

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relative

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Anna: to its host galaxy, the

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overmassive black holes. So what's the new

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explanation?

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Avery: New research published this week on Arxiv,

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led by Muhammad Latif at UAE University,

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proposes a, uh, compelling mechanism in the

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earliest Cosmic environments. Certain

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galaxies were extraordinarily gas rich

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and embedded in particularly dense dark

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matter halos. That combination created

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conditions where gas could fall into the

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central black hole far faster than the

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surrounding galaxy could form stars.

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Anna: Though the black hole got a head start, it

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never lost exactly.

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Avery: The researchers call this rapid early phase

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episodic super Eddington accretion. The black

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hole was consuming gas at rates that exceed

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the theoretical limit that normally governs

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how fast accretion can proceed in these

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extreme early environments. That limit may

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have been routinely broken.

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Anna: This paper also identifies these over massive

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black holes as potentially the missing link

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between what are called heavy seeds, the

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primordial black holes that formed from the

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collapse of the very first massive stars, and

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the luminous quasars we observe later in

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cosmic history.

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Avery: There is also a separate but related finding

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this week on JWST's data from two

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specific early galaxies, named in the

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research as Kola 1 and Nepla 4,

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seen just 800 million years after the Big

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Bang, where the black holes appear to have

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grown far faster than their host galaxies.

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The JWST spectroscopy detected

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broad hydrogen emission lines, a, uh,

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telltale signature of gas swirling rapidly

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around the supermassive black hole.

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Anna: That we're getting closer to a, uh, coherent

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story of how the universe's largest

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structures assembled themselves in those

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first billion years. JWST keeps

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delivering.

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Avery: If you thought the James Webb Space Telescope

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changed everything, and it did, you should be

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paying close attention to what's coming next.

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NASA's Nancy Grace Roman Space Telescope

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is now confirmed for launch as early as

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September 2026. That's eight months

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ahead of its mandated deadline, and it's

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under budget, which almost

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Anna: never happens with flagship space telescopes.

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Avery: Almost never. NASA administrator Jared

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Isaacman announced the updated timeline at a

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news conference at Goddard Space Flight

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center in April. And since then, the

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telescope has completed construction and is

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being prepared for shipment to Kennedy Space

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center in Florida. It'll ride to orbit on a

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SpaceX Falcon Heavy.

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Anna: Walk us through what Roman actually does,

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because I think a lot of people haven't heard

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as much about it as they will once it

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launches.

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Avery: Roman is built around the primary mirror

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that's similar in size to Hubble, about

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2.4 meters across. But where Hubble

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sees a relatively narrow field of view.

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Roman's Wide Field Instrument captures a

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patch of sky at least a hundred times larger

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in a single exposure. And it surveys the

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sky at, uh, more than a thousand times

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Hubble's speed.

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Anna: That's an almost incomprehensible upgrade

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in survey capability.

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Avery: By the end of its planned five year primary

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mission, Roman is expected to accumulate

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around 20,000 terabytes of data.

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Scientists will use that to investigate

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around 100,000 exoplanets, hundreds

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of millions of galaxies, billions of

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stars. And the mission team fully expects to

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find phenomena that have never been observed.

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Anna: The primary scientific targets are dark

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energy and dark matter, the invisible

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scaffolding of the universe that we know must

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exist but can't directly see. Roman should

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be able to map how much dark matter is

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distributed across cosmic time in a way

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that's never been possible before.

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Avery: It also carries a coronagraph instrument, the

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most advanced starlight suppression

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technology ever flown in space, which will

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enable direct imaging of planets around

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nearby stars. That's a key stepping stone in

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the

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Anna: search for earth like worlds September

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2026 mark the calendar.

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Astronomy is about to get very, very busy.

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Avery: Our final story today involves a visitor from

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beyond our solar system and two new

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revelations about it that are genuinely

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extraordinary.

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Anna: The interstellar comet 3 I

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HE L A S. We've spoken about this before on

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Astronomy Daily. It was officially discovered

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on 1 July 2025 by the

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ATLAS telescope network in Chile, the third

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interstellar object ever detected passing

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through our solar system.

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Avery: And there are two new developments this week.

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The first, researchers have found that 3i a

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atlas was actually being imaged by the Vera C

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Rubin Observatory in Chile for more than a

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week before its official discovery. The Comet

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nearly became 3i Rubin. Images from

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between 21 June and 2 July

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2025 show it clearly in Rubin data. But

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the observatory was still in its science

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validation phase at the time, not yet in full

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operation. Nobody was looking at those frames

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in real time.

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Anna: That's a fascinating footnote about the state

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of our sky survey infrastructure. Had Rubin

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been fully operational, we would have had

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over a week of additional early tracking

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data.

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Avery: And that matters enormously for

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characterizing these objects. The earlier you

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catch them, the better you understand their

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trajectory, their composition, their size.

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Anna: The second development is even more striking.

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Research led by the University of Michigan

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and published in Nature Astronomy

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reveals that the water inside 2i

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Atlas is unlike anything we've ever

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found in our own solar system. Specifically,

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its ratio of heavy water water

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molecules, where one hydrogen atom is

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replaced by deuterium, is at least 30

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times higher than anything found in comets

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from our own solar system.

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Avery: Thirty times? That's not a small difference.

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Anna: It's a profound one. Deuterium is a heavier

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isotope of hydrogen, and the ratio of

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deuterium to regular hydrogen in water is a

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chemical fossil. It records the temperature

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conditions where the water formed. High

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deuterium means the water formed in an

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extremely cold environment, far colder than

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the outer reaches of our own solar system.

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Avery: So 3 IA atlas forms somewhere colder

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and stranger than anything in our

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neighborhood. A different kind of planetary

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system, possibly much further from its parent

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star.

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Anna: The researchers at ALMA Observatory described

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it beautifully. They said each interstellar

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comet brings a little bit of its history, its

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fossils from elsewhere in the galaxy. We

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don't know exactly where 3 IA Atlas came

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from, but with instruments like ALMA and

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Rubin and jwst, we're beginning to

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read the chemical biography of another star

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system.

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Avery: And the comet itself is estimated to be

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nearly 12 billion years old. Its

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parent star system may no longer exist. We're

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reading the message from a stellar

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civilization of ice and rock that formed

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before our sun was born.

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Anna: Space travel in slow motion across

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12 billion years before we go

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a, uh,

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Avery: quick heads up for your skies tonight. Look

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west after sunset and you'll find a lovely

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pairing. Jupiter glows brightly beside the

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waxing crescent moon. The crescent acts as a

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natural pointer. Jupiter will be the

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brightest star like object nearby. No

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telescope needed, though. Binoculars will

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show Jupiter's four Galilean moons as tiny

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dots in a line. Southern Hemisphere viewers

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look northwest after dark. Enjoy it.

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Anna: That's Astronomy daily for Wednesday,

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May 21, 2026.

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Season 5 Episode 107

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Big Day Tomorrow with Starship. We'll be

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watching.

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Avery: If you're enjoying the show, please

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00:19:32.360 --> 00:19:34.720
subscribe, leave a review and tell a fellow

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00:19:34.720 --> 00:19:37.590
space enthusiast. Find us at astronomydaily

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IO and across all platforms as

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astrodaily. Pod. This is Anna and

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Avery. Keep looking up.