The Supermassive Podcast - 2026: The year in space... And at sea?!

Episode Date: February 11, 2026

What are the biggest space missions of 2026? And what are the best stargazing opportunities this year? The Supermassive Team - Izzie Clarke, Dr Becky Smethurst, Dr Robert Massey and Richard Hollingham - share their astronomical excitement for the year ahead and ponder if they should charter a boat for the August eclipse.Thank you to listeners Anne Edgeworth and Karolina who inspired this episode.To support the show, join The Supermassive Club for ad-free listening, forum access, and extra content from the team. If you have a question for the team - or have a boat we can borrow! - get in touch via [e-mail] or on Instagram, @SupermassivePod.The Supermassive Podcast is a Boffin Media production. The producers are Izzie Clarke and Richard Hollingham. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Hello and welcome to another bonus episode of the Supermassive podcast from the Royal Astronomical Society with me, science journalist Izzy Clark, astrophysicist Dr Becky Smethyst, the Society's deputy director, Dr Robert Massey, and producer, editor, Silent Lurker, Richard Hollingham. I'm really not comfortable with this silent lurker business. I think you find it was supermassive Lurker as well. I'm not comfortable with this at all. Also, I love how we just didn't explain last episode. You know, we had that question last episode about like, what's an asteroid? What's a comet? What's a meteor? We should have explained like, I'm the astrophysicist, Roberts the astronomer. Rich is like the rocket scientist. And I'm here for the vibes. Okay. And then, yeah, we should have explained the difference between those three different things. Because obviously they get confused. Anyway, these bonus episodes, right, we usually tackle your questions that you've sent in. Bush, if you listen to last episode, you'll notice we're a little bit questions. We've questioned out after that. So we thought it would be fun to take the opportunity to look at the year ahead

and chat about some of the biggest space events happening in 2026. So yeah, before we dive into that, I just want to say thank you again to everyone that supports this show. I realise it's not possible for everyone, but it really helps us keep making the show if you join the Supermassive Club for a small monthly fee. Not only do you get ad-free episodes, but there are a few forums on there. And it's where me and a few other of the members chat about stargazing, book recommendations, and more. So go to supermassive. Dot Supportingcast.com to join or there's a link in our episode description.

Right, Adminova, let's get on to talking about this year. And it is something that a few of you asked about. So listener Karolina, for example, wants to know what are the space missions we're most excited for this year. Good question, Karolina. Okay, for me, it's got to be the Nancy Grace Roman Space Telescope. The launch is set for September of this year, but it might get push back to 27. Who knows? We'll see. Hopefully it will be this year.

Now, this is a true follow-up to the Hubble Space Telescope. So I know we always talk about JDBST as being like Hubble's successor, and I remember around when it was launched, that was sort of the narrative about J-D-BST, but it really wasn't, right? J-DVST was completely different to Hubble. It was so much bigger. It looked in the infrared rather than visible wavelengths of light.

Whereas Roman really is the follow-up. It's pretty much exactly the same size of mirror. It's looking at a similar wavelength, So colors of light range of visible with a little bit of infrared and a little bit of ultraviolet, but not quite as much as Hubble. The thing that's different, because I bet you're now thinking, the little it sounds exactly the same to Hubble. Why are you replacing it?

Hubble is obviously also coming to the end of its life in terms of moving parts and its orbit and everything like that. But the reason Roman is different, it will just have a massive field of view. It's like a hundred times bigger than Hubble's field of view, but with the same resolution and clarity. So if you can imagine like Hubble images, but oh, over such a more massive area. So it's really going to be very transformative.

And over the first five years of observations, like it's set to image like 50 times the sky area that Hubble's image just in its like 30 years of service. So it's very, very cool instrument. Three quarter visits time, it will be spent on like survey missions, you know, where it's like a designated thing that it's doing. It's always looking in certain parts of the sky, either to find exoplanets or map dark matter where it is in the universe

or spot supernova for, you know, understanding the acceleration of the universe better, which is our next episode. But the rest of the time, it's going to be used like the Hubble Space Telescope and JWST R now in that, you know, astronomers will apply to use it for their specific science case and like drill down on something specific. And actually the call for proposals went out in December, which was like the most insane email to get. You know, and like you're like, you've been hearing about something coming online for ages and ages

and ages. And then you finally get this email being like, how would you like to use rober? and apply for time to use it. The deadline is March 2026 and you go, ah, how are we already at this point? You know, it's absolutely crazy. It's such an exciting time for me and all my colleagues. It's a huge one, actually, isn't it, for this year?

It is huge, yeah. And I feel like not many people have heard about Roman, you know. I feel like there's a lot of publicity on like the big ones being built on the ground, like the extremely large telescopes and there's been a lot of on Rubin obviously recently. And, you know, there's been a lot on Euclin and J-D-Bastee, but Roman. Come on, everyone. It really will be then a sort of golden age for exploration with all these observatories

and Hubble's still operating as well which I just think is extraordinary and because we have the Hubble images alongside the James Webb images but also to have these other observatories at the same time. Yeah, it's incredible and I think I don't I mean I don't really remember at least in the first last 10 years of my career maybe a bit more than 13

like there being this kind of a time where There's been so many observatories coming online around them at the same time. So it's going to be very transformative. Lots of telescopes doing big surveys, yes, but then also we've still got things like Roman to do that sort of detailed science that we like to do as well. And as we always say, it's the things that we don't know about as well. Like, what is this going to bring up? Like it's so exciting.

Robert, what about you? What are you excited for this year? Yeah. I mean, well, definitely, Nancy Grace Roman, you know, and it'll be interesting to see actually if the images are quite as iconic as Hubble. you know, presumably that's going to be about the team there, really getting them out there because I can just see that being, you know, hopefully we'll see those images splashed all over papers, all over websites and we'll all be seeing those too.

But there's a few, really. I like the ESA Plateau mission, which is coming possibly the end of this year, possibly early 2027. And this has the classic, you know, acronym constructed to make a word, planetary transits and oscillation of stars. So sort of does what he says, basically. So it's going to be looking for exoplanets around other stars through. the transit method, searching about a million stars, but more distributed than Kepler was that did

that. And there's a lot of UK involvement. There's a guy, Don Palako in Warwick, who we should probably talk to at some point who was one of the people who instigated it. And it's going to be looking for Earth-like and larger exoplanets. Because in all of the ways we've tried to find them, you know, there are relatively few, actually. You hear very often know Super Earth or Earth 2.0 in press releases and so on. We're not really there yet. You know, we're still, we still need to If we think that planets like Earth are good places for life to evolve and emerge, we really do need to find a lot more of them to have some kind of handle on whether it's ubiquitous, let alone to start actually finding out whether there's genuine in life on them or not.

Yeah, you're right, though. There's not that many known. Like the kind of number where, you know, ex upon it scientists could still sort of list them all by name. And when I say name, they're all like, you know, Kepler 132F and like JG4, whatever it is. You know, it's all catalog numbers. So it is quite fun to think, would we ever get to a stage where you can't list them all by name? I'm sure someone would be able to do. Yeah, I know exactly.

And that's the thing is it. So maybe if we start to get hundreds of those, that could be really an amazing step forward. And just maybe, you know, some of those are going to have life on them. Who knows? But it's another of those incremental steps along the way. And then the other one I quite like is there's the Chinese lunar mission, Changi 7, which is going to include a South Pole lander on the South Pole. And that's significant because that's where there's water ice under the surface, we think.

And it's also seen as a good site for a her. hopefully nicely international future moon base. And I'm putting that in big as there is, it's not a very big area actually where you can put moon bases and get there's these things called the peaks of eternal light where they almost always have the sun above the horizons. They're good for solar power. And those areas, little mountain tops and rims of craters. And the amount of ice there probably isn't all that much, but it's very, very accessible. So I hope is really that, you know, the powers collaborate on that rather than putting down a flag and trying to claim different sites. But regardless of that, I think it would be really cool to actually

have images and to have something on the ground on the surface they're doing that work to find out if there really is lots of water ice. I haven't thought about this before, but how is it going to work with Changi 7 being a South Pole lander, but also Artemis is targeting the South Pole as well? So is there going to be some clashes of like, no, you can't land here on slightly different sides. I have to sort of hope that there's enough cooperation to make that work. And I can't remember the person who I spoke to. I did write a piece about this actually for the being.

BBC on space diplomacy. There is a whole sort of academic branch of space diplomacy. And that's the genuine concern that there will be two separate bases, possibly more, you know, with other countries like India or countries in the Middle East looking at also lunar exploration. Yeah, but on the same opposite sides of the same crater. Well, this is a thing is it's a very crater. Exactly.

Even if you think, well, the South Pole will be big. There's probably not that many places you could like that. You could have, yeah, you could have, I don't know whether you saw the Apple TV series for all mankind. And that had that very scenario. Only then it was the Soviet Union and the US, you know, sort of facing off over quite a small distance on the moon. But at the moment, that is the way things are lining up. You'll have a Chinese base on the moon and you'll have a US-led base on the moon. It makes so much sense, doesn't it, to be like, just talk to each other.

I know that there's like lots of things to negotiate on that. but like surely pooling information would just be really helpful. But on that, I mean, there's so many Chinese missions happening this year. Obviously there's Changi 7. There's also Tianan Ren 2, which is looking at collecting samples from an asteroid as well. They're also launching a space telescope. And there's talk of a launch of a reusable rocket. Okay, that's a private company looking into that.

But I think once I started looking into it, I was like, oh, okay, you know, China are doing quite a lot this year. There's quite a lot of variety there. On the whole collaboration, there is this UN committee on the peaceful use of outer space. I'm supposed to be going to the meeting in Vienna next month. And I don't know if the lunar stuff is coming up on the agenda, but it's the kind of thing they're supposed to talk about. So diplomats get in a room. I guess it's probably quite exciting if you're a diplomat, isn't it, really, to be talking about this stuff. And they're supposed to thrash this stuff out.

So we'll see. I really hope they do. Because as you say, China is doing really great things in space. So it would be nice if that was done in collaboration. And hopefully other domestic issues or terrestrial issues don't get in the way. And Richard, what about you? Is there anything else that you're looking forward to that we haven't mentioned already? Well, I'd like to bring it back to a bit of idealism. And the idealism of the Voyager missions of launched in 1977.

So Voyager 1 and Voyager 2 would have been going 49 years. Still going next year, the 50th anniversary of these amazing missions. And in November this year, Voyager 1 will be one light day from Earth. Wow. An arbitrary unit, yay. Yeah, an armatory unit. So, you know, that means effectively, you know, it's a 24 hours for a signal from Voyager 1 to reach us. And I think it also shows just how big space is

and how when we're talking about, you know, interstellar travel, these dreams of traveling to the nearest stars or to these exoplanets, how long it takes using current technology. But it is extraordinary, and it's extraordinary they can still receive a signal from this spacecraft that is so far, so far away, outside our solar system. And yet still what, like 0.0.05% of the way to the next nearest star. It's absolutely crazy. So I've actually got up here how far away it is.

Currently, constantly changes. Currently, right, as we're recording this, so it's going to be a lot further from the time we finish. But you look at the... Is that editing time, I look. Excuse me, no, I think you'll find that we release an episode every two weeks. I think you find it's very heavily scheduled. Yeah, it's all pre-planned.

So it is currently, what, 15 billion, 920,000. million 48,720 miles away. Also, can we say another thing that's happening in November 2026 is that after eight years, Beppe Colombo is finally entering orbit around Mercury. Oh, go Beppie Colombo. And this is one of those things. I've been talking to people about Beppie Colombo. When was it?

It was like last year. And we're like, why did it take so long to get to Mercury? It's not that far away. And I'm like, well, you could just fire it at Mercury, but it would sling right past it and it wouldn't slow down. The reason it takes eight years to get there is because it has to slow down to actually enter its orbit around it. But that's so exciting that it's nearly there.

There's a lot of people who've been waiting a long time for that. I don't know how people work on missions like that, like make their research about, like, you know, I'll now just launch it in our way eight years. I just don't think I have the patience. No. I'd be like, it's launched. I'd like my answers now, please. Thank you very much.

It is a real concern, though, in terms of the team. So you develop a spacecraft, you develop your satellite or your spacecraft going to Mercury. You have all your team there, you work out what your research is going to be. What do you do for those eight years? So you have to go away. You lose a lot for your team. They go off and join other teams, do something else. You leave the expertise.

Yeah. Because we're like, oh, that whole instrument on board, who wrote the code for that? blah, blah, blah. They retired five years ago. Like, no one knows how to work that. You know, so you really have to like keep on top of that kind of stuff. Have you written your hand over? Come on. Yeah.

But yeah, for those who are unfamiliar with Beppi, this is a spacecraft which will then separate into two science orbiters. So you've got the Mercury planetary orbiter, which is going to look at the planet's surface and interior. And then you've got something from the Japanese Space Agency Jaxa, which is the Mercury, magnetospheric orbiter, which I don't normally say correctly, so that's a good one. And that's looking at Mercury's really powerful magnetic environment.

So they're going to, together, just tell us so much more about Mercury. Yeah, because there's so much that we don't know about such a close planet. Yeah, exactly. Okay, and then so following on from that, Anne Edwards has also asked what stargazing events are we most looking forward to. So I think we have to give this to Robert first. first one yeah I mean it's got to be the total solar eclipse on the 12th of August right the first one in Europe since 2015 I know I know it stole it from Becky and that's in a total solar eclipse is when the the moon is directly between the earth and the

sun and close enough to the earth because the means distance varies that it completely blocks out the bright surface of the sun the photosphere what that means is that day becomes night more or less and you see the wonderful outer atmosphere of the sun the corona and people travel from all over the world to see these things but the good news with this one is that it's running across, well, Greenland and Iceland, so if you'd venture as you could see it theoretically at least see the eclipse and northern lights at the same time.

Weather buildings, would that be amazing? It goes across the Atlantic, a tiny, tiny bit of Portugal and then across Spain and the Balearic Islands. And yes, I am absolutely planning to go and see it, and we'll see. I mean, the weather forecast isn't too bad. So fingers crossed. Wait, they're forecasting it that far out in advance in August.

Oh, only the, well, the climatological Well, they look at the cloud cover typically at that type of year and stuff. Spain isn't terrible, but it's quite low in the sky, so you need to make sure you're not in a place where it's concealed by forest or mountains or buildings or something like that. That's a consideration. That is a concern, isn't it, about this eclipse? Because it's so low.

Yeah, it's like it sunset, yeah. Yeah, so is it a good bet to try and be able to see, is to be actually on the ocean? I guess it depends where you are. Yeah. Are we chartering a boat? Is this what's happening? Wouldn't that be great?

I think yes and no if you're on a boat please don't promise that Robert please don't promise that I'm leaving that in the edit and sharing that with the world we'll use some of Becky's consultancy fee for it I think

that would cover it right job done job done I'm for some astronomers somewhere have a boat like I'm sure I can find a colleague who's like yeah I got silver let's do it if you're listening to this

and you're a chartered captain please get in touch I mean it's like it's a good idea You have to be very agile, I think, because if you go out into the Atlantic, as we all know, we all live in Britain, we know what the weather's like, and the Atlantic is that on steroids really. So you can at least move around. And if you've got good forecast and you're able to travel quickly, you might be able to get to the place where the sky is clear. But at sunset, it's a dish, it's harder because you know, you really need that sight line through the atmosphere is so long. You really have to get very lucky that there are no clouds in the way. But, you know, that said. But sunsets are like my favorite thing. Exactly. See a sunset and an eclipse at the same time.

Like a sunset toenail sun? Oh. Tono moon are accepted, but toenail sun, come on. It's so lyrically. Oh, we got through the whole episode without mentioning it. I'm going to start charging you, Becky. Fiverr goes in the toenail jar every time. Oh, don't start that toenail jar.

Lovely four. Anyway, I guess I've got a pick A bit different now I'm to say something new Because Robert picked the eclipse So I always look forward to the Perseid's meteor shower Which peaks in August at the new moon So because the eclipse is obviously at the new moon on the 12th

It means the Perseid's peaks at the same time So I was thinking about how convenient that is If you are planning a trip Make sure that when you plan in your eclipse trip You plan somewhere close to maybe like a darker sky site So maybe the middle of the ocean is a great shout is he maybe that is what we should do I've got some research to do guys leave it with me

but I was looking as well obviously we all know favourite planet is Saturn and Saturn does reach opposition on the 4th of October 2026 so opposition is when it is closest in its orbit to Earth essentially because you can draw a straight line between the sun

Earth and Saturn is in the opposite part of the sky from the sun hence opposition which means it rises you know at sunset and sets at sunrise so it's visible all night and it's the brightest that it gets in the sky because it's like fully lit from our perspective here on earth by the sun. Plus the rings will have tilted again by that point because you remember last year they were right edge on the rings so you can barely even

see them. They were just this tiny skinny thin line so you would show it to people who've never seen Saturn in a telescope before and they'd be like, where are the rings? And you're like, I'm so sorry but they're not visible at the moment and they'd be like what? So yeah, they will just have an amazing view when Saturn's at opposition, the rings will be tilted up to us. And I just love seeing other people see Saturn through a telescope for the first time. I just like share in their joy, right? I've had people claim that it looks like, the people are like, you've put a sticker on the end of the telescope. And I'm like, I haven't. I promise. That's just what it looks like. It looks so, so cool. So I am looking forward to that. I think just because it'll be winter or getting into

wintertime again, the nights will be longer. There'll just be lots of opportunity to see Saturn whenever you do have a clear night. And yeah, I just love it. much of you. Richard, what about you? Anything else that you want to throw in there? I think Becky said it all. We're really, with looking at the planets for a telescope is just the most extraordinary thing. And that's my pledge for the years. Just get my act together with my telescope, get my gear together, get everything ready to go. So essentially, you know, set up the telescope properly during the day, check the batteries are all set up, check the sighting is all right, get it going. So all and get the big coat. Get everything ready.

So it's like my clarinet practice. If the clarinet is there and set up, I will play it if it's in the case, I won't. So get everything set up, get it all working, get out and do it. It sounds like you're a father like packing the hospital bag before like a baby's born. You're like, I've got everything ready for when I'm told to go, go, go, go. It's a bit that it's so interesting because I was looking at like, what do I want from this year? And one of my goals for this year was to be a better astronomer. and so I have decided I am finally going to get a C star

and I also want to dabble a bit more with astrophotography so I just hopefully Maybe we do an astrophotography episode isy and that can be like your revision for starting it that would be amazing I'll just be like furiously note-taking and then yes okay got it so I can't say that there is one major event it's just kind of being like just see more of them look up more

I know what you mean I feel like I've been a bit of a bad astronomer in the past like year or so because I'm just like I might just stay asleep I did get out for the Northern Lights for the invisible light back in May 2020 24 that was fine

is yeah I know that's still a source point for you we'll move on hey I have seen them I made the second one it's fair but I feel like I'm just being like I'll just stay in bed and I'm like no get up you know these really are once in a lifetime

get up out of bed yes I the thing that's holding me back is not having a good thermos flask. So I need to... C-star and a thermos flask. There we go. There's some really nice designs for thermos. There's some really retro designs for thermos flasks.

Because I did ask for one for Christmas and get one, so I might treat them. I'm going to... Because you're absolutely right. So that's these to go in my emergency hospital kit. As Becky described it. So, yeah, I just need everything ready to go. I need everything ready to go. Everything set up.

Because I looked at the sky, you know, a couple of nights ago. And it got out of the car, looked at the sky, it was really cold. And I guess this is fantastic. I should get a telescope out. And then you think about all the fast and the calibration at the set of when you do that. Exactly. Exactly that. The telescope's not aligned.

This is why C-stars are great because you just press a button on your phone and it does it. You're like, thinking, well, yes. Lazy astronomers. Hey, I was just said I'd do more. I didn't say I'd, you know, work harder. But what about, is there anything else that you guys are excited for for 2020? We've covered a lot. I just want to pick up on the Artemis.

I would like to see some progress on a moon lander for NASA. We debated whether it was a good thing or a bad thing to go back to the moon in the last episode. But I think with the, you know, NASA's talked about Artemis 3 landing in 2028. That's really not going to happen. I can't see how that can possibly happen because there is no lander. So I'd like to see some progress, whether that's from Blue Origin or SpaceX or just something else.

Otherwise, we lose the momentum. So whatever you think about Artemis, you're going to have Artemis II going around the moon. The idea is to then go back and land on the moon. But we could so easily lose the momentum after Artemis II unless there is a lander ready to go. Great point. Robert?

It is a good point. Yeah, yeah. Well, I mean, I'm going to look more prosaically at more things in the sky, I think. And it's worth remembering. It was remembering. We're still at, you know, not far off sunspot maximum. The sun's still very active.

even what, a couple of weeks ago, there was another great display of the Northern Lights over the UK, which I managed to miss because the only part of the UK that had cloud was the southeast, but never mind. I'm not bitter. I've seen them before. I'm Australia too. Those people in Australia that were seeing it, which you forget how far like North Australia actually is in comparison to like how far north we are. Did you know what I'm trying to say they're not as close to the polls as well circles as we are up here in Europe, right? But they don't know they had a grave view, exactly. So it's still there. So still, you know, do still keep in on that. It's still that nice time. And I think we've been really, really so lucky

with this whole series of brilliant displays. Actually, I can't remember previous sunspot cycles where it was that good. So fingers crossed for a few more of those. And the other, as well as the percieds, the Gemini's meteor and Shower in December is a bit overlooked. But it was really good this year. You know, if you get clear skies and let's face it,

December's a bit chancy. Actually, it's a really good one to look out for. So little celestial events like that. Do keep an eye on those. Or we'll obviously keep telling you about those on this podcast. And here's hoping, fingers crossed, for just a lovely comet that we can see with the naked eye just in case. Well, there is a prospect of one. There is a tentative prospect of one.

I'm trying to remember the name, but it's a Croyce sungrazer. It's been discovered. It's still quite far from the sun. It's going to get quite close to the sun. And these can be quite bright. So we will see. And I think it's predicted to be bright in April thereabouts. But it's early days.

So we probably need to be listening to the next podcast or so when we've got a bit more information on it. but that is ended up. Was that YR4? Was it YR4? No, it's E-226A1 Maps. There we go. So that's the memorable name

associated with that. But yeah, that's another one just possibly in the spring. There'll be a nice comet in the sky. Who knows? I think listeners need to chip in with what they would call that comet

because we need an easier name. Well, people are calling it comet maps now, MAPS, right? So you can call it maps. I wanted to be more zany, personally. But anyway, that's something for another time. Another time.

I think that is it for this episode. We've covered so much. If you would like to add to the Supermassive mailbox and please do, you can email your questions, your pictures, anything else to podcast at r.res.org. Send them on Instagram at supermassive pod. Or if you're a member of the Supermassive Club, then you can post them in the forum.

We'll be back in a few weeks' time where we'll be diving into what the heck is going on with our understanding of the acceleration of the universe. I'm very excited for that one. I just love. Cosmology is really fun to talk about, not so much to do. And I think we might have our first ever Nobel Prize winning guest on the show. But TBC, we'll have to see what happens to the actual episode. But yes.

Fingers crossed. And I'm sure, I hope that will bring you back to listen to the podcast. Because if that doesn't, then nothing else will. Until next time, everybody, happy Stargating.