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Episode: Spacecraft attempts closest-ever approach to Sun

Author: BBC World Service
Duration: 00:28:55

Episode Shownotes

The probe is plunging into the sun's outer atmosphere, amid brutal temperatures. Also; the UN warns that famine is spreading in Sudan, with Darfur among the worst affected regions.

Full Transcript

00:00:00 Speaker_09
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00:00:38 Speaker_10
This is the Global News Podcast from the BBC World Service. I'm Alex Ritson, and at 14 hours GMT on Tuesday 24th December, these are our main stories. A NASA spacecraft tries to fly closer to the sun than any previous man-made object.

00:00:56 Speaker_10
The UN warns that famine is spreading across Sudan, with the region of Darfur among the worst affected. And hundreds of people demonstrate in Christian areas of the Syrian capital Damascus over the burning of a Christmas tree. Also in this podcast.

00:01:15 Speaker_13
I read something like 30% of the island have power back and only 27% have water back.

00:01:22 Speaker_10
A rare glimpse into life on the island of Mayotte in the aftermath of Cyclone Chido. Never has man or a man-made object got so close to the sun.

00:01:38 Speaker_10
Flying at almost 700,000 kilometres an hour, NASA's Parker Solar Probe is right now soaring through the sun's outer atmosphere, battling scorching temperatures and extreme radiation in the process.

00:01:52 Speaker_10
NASA's head of science, Dr Nicola Fox, says it's all to improve humanity's understanding of our great star.

00:01:59 Speaker_16
We've never been able to sort of explain some of these mysteries, things like why is the corona, that hazy atmosphere that you see during a total solar eclipse, why is that roughly 300 times hotter than the visible surface of the sun?

00:02:13 Speaker_16
Why does this atmosphere get super energized so much so that it can break away from the pull of a huge magnetic star and bathe all of the planets? It carves out a protective bubble for us.

00:02:26 Speaker_16
And as we're looking for planets in other solar systems that could actually, you know, harbor life, we need to understand how our star works so that we can know what kind of stars we're looking for in other galaxies as we search for more and more exoplanets.

00:02:44 Speaker_10
At its closest, the NASA probe will be 6.2 million kilometres from the Sun's surface. Seems far away, but in space terms, it's closer than you might think, as I heard from Dr Jennifer Millard, an astronomer at Fifth Star Labs based in the UK. It's extraordinarily close.

00:03:00 Speaker_18
In fact, it'll be the closest we've ever gotten to the surface of the Sun. And this probe will be flying through the Sun's outer atmosphere. So we will quite literally be touching the Sun. That's how close it's getting.

00:03:14 Speaker_18
And I know that that does sound a great distance, you know, over six million kilometres, but it's only about five solar diameters or about 16 Earth-Moon distances. It's much, much closer than Mercury's orbit. So yeah, very close indeed.

00:03:31 Speaker_10
My understanding of the Sun is that it is very, very, very, very hot. How can something get that close and not just be obliterated, not just melt? Great question. And yes, the surface of the sun is about 6,000 degrees Celsius.

00:03:41 Speaker_18
And then the outer atmosphere, the corona that this probe is flying through, well, that's actually millions of degrees. But because the particles are so few up there, it won't actually heat up and you'll vaporize the spacecraft. What we're really concerned about is that 6,000 degrees surface.

00:03:59 Speaker_18
So the cooling system on this craft is astonishing. It's kept cool.

00:04:06 Speaker_18
instruments operate at about room temperature by just four and a half inches of carbon foam and then a cooling system that uses just about four litres of water. And the outside of that shield is also painted white to help reflect away as much radiation as possible.

00:04:20 Speaker_18
But that's it, white paint, foam and water. It's amazing, isn't it?

00:04:29 Speaker_10
And I understand that the scientists who are monitoring this from the ground are going to lose contact with it for a few hours and they are going to be nerve-wracking hours because they may not make contact again if it goes wrong. Yeah, it's a few days really.

00:04:42 Speaker_18
So the craft sent out what we call a beacon tone on the 22nd of December to say, right, I'm off. I'll see you on the other side, hopefully. And then that's it because while it's this close to the Sun, we can't communicate with the spacecraft.

00:04:53 Speaker_18
It has to do everything autonomously.

00:05:00 Speaker_18
So it has four different systems on board to keep it pointing in the right direction because we really don't want those instruments accidentally pointing at the Sun because they will be fried and it will be broken.

00:05:09 Speaker_18
And then it's going to take a few days for it to complete its mission and then the 27th roughly is when we're expecting a second beacon tone

00:05:17 Speaker_18
and that'll be the spacecraft saying, I've made it, I've done it, I've survived, and then it's going to take a few weeks to get all the data downloaded. Astronomer Dr Jennifer Millard.

00:05:25 Speaker_10
It's been described as the world's worst humanitarian crisis. Now, according to a report by the United Nations, the number of people affected by famine in Sudan is getting bigger. It says famine conditions have been confirmed in five areas and five more

00:05:38 Speaker_10
are expected by May because of the ongoing civil war between the army and the paramilitary group, the RSF.

00:05:49 Speaker_10
On Monday, the Sudanese government announced it was suspending its participation in the Global Hunger Monitoring System. I heard more from our Africa regional editor, Richard Kagoy, who's monitoring the situation from the Kenyan capital, Nairobi.

00:06:04 Speaker_03
This report helps us understand the prevailing food insecurity situation in Sudan, and specifically affecting those who have been internally displaced as a result of the 20-month conflict that's been ongoing.

00:06:18 Speaker_03
So currently we're looking at about 24.6 million people desperately needing aid.

00:06:24 Speaker_03
and looking at four camps which have been affected in North Darfur and South Kordofan state and also 17 other areas have been identified that are at risk of farming and five more would likely slip into farming in the next five months so casting a very dire situation in Sudan. Yeah, the numbers are staggering.

00:06:43 Speaker_10
And now the government of Sudan suspending its involvement in the monitoring system and with humanitarian aid groups. Absolutely.

00:06:53 Speaker_03
So the Sudanese agriculture minister sent a note to diplomats and this particular committee

00:07:08 Speaker_03
indicating that they feel the findings of this report are not quite accurate over the situation on the ground, simply because it says that the committee, they doubt its ability to actually collect data from areas that are controlled by the paramilitary rapid support forces.

00:07:16 Speaker_03
Also saying that the report did not take into account the malnutrition data in the past couple of months, especially the cultivation that took place during the summer rainy season. And that's really their bone of contention. So how much food aid is actually getting in and finding its way to where it should be?

00:07:35 Speaker_03
You would say there's been significant progress that has been made in that regard since both parties agreed to lift a blockade on humanitarian access. And that's been happening for the past about four months.

00:07:49 Speaker_03
And this has really helped to alleviate what would have been a very desperate and a very difficult crisis situation in Sudan. So that's happened. But they feel that it's not really enough, that much needs to be done in terms of protecting even aid workers, because there have been incidences where they have been attacked. And that's a major concern.

00:08:04 Speaker_03
Richard Kigoy.

00:08:09 Speaker_10
Nativity celebrations in Bethlehem have been scaled back for the second year in a row as war continues in the Middle East. There is no Christmas tree in Manger Square outside the Church of the Nativity, believed to be the site of the birthplace of Jesus.

00:08:23 Speaker_10
But Dr Bernard Sabella, who's a retired professor of sociology at Bethlehem University, says people are still holding their own private festivities.

00:08:35 Speaker_20
Despite the public disappearance of the celebrations, there is still Christmas being celebrated within families, within churches, and joy is there. The message is that we should really work for peace. We should stop this war. I got the latest from our reporter Emir Nader, who's in Bethlehem.

00:09:01 Speaker_17
I'm looking out over Manger Square now, just in front of the 1700-year-old Church of the Nativity, where usually at this time of the year, at this time of the day, there'd be marching bands, children playing, there'd be a tree set up, but all I can see is dignitaries and we've been walking around, the hotels are empty, there's no pilgrims

00:09:24 Speaker_17
war rages on. Now, the head of the Catholic Church here, who will be presiding over the mass tonight, just returned.

00:09:39 Speaker_17
He was able to get to Gaza, and he gave a ceremony there to the Palestinian Christians and said he wanted to reassure them.

00:09:51 Speaker_17
He said, we will rebuild Gaza, the war will end, and the world is with you. He said that Gaza is destroyed but the people aren't.

00:10:06 Speaker_17
So very present on the minds of Palestinian Christians is the fact that the war continues, over 45,000 Palestinians have been killed and everyone is just hoping for a ceasefire deal to be reached as soon as possible. Yeah, what is the latest on that?

00:10:13 Speaker_10
Because there were talks in Qatar and a few days ago people seemed quite optimistic something might be about to happen. Yes, I mean, there has been a slight, subtle shift in the tone that we are perceiving.

00:10:27 Speaker_17
As you said, in recent days, there have been positive signals coming out of these talks with mention of, you know, a ceasefire deal could be reached in days. And that really got people's hopes up.

00:10:36 Speaker_17
But now Prime Minister Netanyahu gave a speech to the Knesset, the Israeli parliament, yesterday, in which he said progress is being made.

00:10:44 Speaker_17
And at the same time, he was being jeered by opposition leaders who accused him of trying to undermine the negotiations by giving interviews to press and issuing new conditions there.

00:11:02 Speaker_17
One of the sticking points appears to be that the Israeli side is now asking for a full list of names and status of all of the hostages there, while Hamas is saying they need a period of ceasefire to reconnect and make contact with the captors of those hostages there. So yes, hopes are still high, but there are

00:11:10 Speaker_17
beginning to get sort of mixed signals and worries that, you know, will this deal be able to be reached before the inauguration of President Trump at the end of January? Emir Nader.

00:11:23 Speaker_10
In Ukraine, Russian forces are continuing to advance in the eastern region of the country. They're now within a few kilometres of Pokrovsk.

00:11:32 Speaker_10
With its railway line, the city has been a key military hub for Ukraine, but also has cultural significance as the birthplace of a well-known Christmas carol, as the BBC's defence correspondent Jonathan Beale reports.

00:11:49 Speaker_06
the discord of a well-known Christmas carol and a shattered city. But this is where the composer of this tune, Mykola Leontovich, once lived in the early 1900s. Bokrovsk, Russia's next target.

00:12:11 Speaker_06
On its deserted streets, there are few sounds or sights of Christmas. Just a dusting of snow on skeletal structures. And constant shelling. Most of its people have already fled. The gas supply's been cut off. And those who've refused to leave, like Ihor, live in constant fear.

00:12:28 Speaker_06
You never know where the next strike may be.

00:12:34 Speaker_05
We're living in a powder keg.

00:12:39 Speaker_06
And it's not just more territory that's slowly being swallowed up by Russia, but Ukraine's history too. This building was a music school that bore the name of the composer, Mykola Leontowicz. It is now completely empty.

00:12:56 Speaker_06
13-year-old Anna Hasic first learned to play Leontowicz's composition at that music school in Pokrovsk. Most of the world knows it as the Carol of the Bells, but in Ukraine, it's Shchedrik.

00:13:20 Speaker_06
Like most of Pokrov's population, Anna's family has already fled to the relative safety of Dnipro. When I played it at home, it seemed happy.

00:13:30 Speaker_19
It reminded me of winter and Christmas. Now it's more of a sad song to me because it reminds me of home and I really want to go back.

00:13:45 Speaker_06
Angelina Rozhkova is director of Prokhorov's History Museum. Now displaced to Dnipro, but she's determined to keep their city alive.

00:13:56 Speaker_14
For the Russians, it's very important to destroy our culture and ruin everything precious to us. We believe that saving and keeping means winning. That's what we are doing.

00:14:11 Speaker_06
It's hard to say you're winning when you're losing ground. But for one Ukrainian military band, Shugrek has become a tune to inspire resistance.

00:14:23 Speaker_06
Here, they're even taking it to the trenches, using weapons, including rifles and rocket launchers, as improvised instruments. Colonel Bohdan Zadorozhny says it helps lift soldiers' spirits. Those beats and rhythms cheer up the guys.

00:14:42 Speaker_10
Shadrach shows that Ukraine is a civilized nation, now at war, fighting for its identity.

00:14:50 Speaker_06
For Ukraine, there is a special significance to this tune this Christmas. Russia may be able to destroy their towns and cities, But they can't erase Ukraine's separate identity or its past.

00:15:10 Speaker_10
Jonathan Beale with that report. Still to come.

00:15:15 Speaker_02
How military experts have been tracking the movements of Santa Claus.

00:15:43 Speaker_04
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00:16:33 Speaker_10
To Syria now. That's the sound of demonstrators marching in a neighborhood of Damascus, chanting, we will sacrifice our souls for our cross.

00:16:49 Speaker_10
They were protesting after video showed the burning of a Christmas tree near the city of Hama, which surfaced on social media. There are reports of other demonstrations around the country. So what more do we know? Our Middle East correspondent, Lina Sinjab, is in Beirut.

00:17:05 Speaker_21
It seems that this is one of several incidents that happened over the past few days by people who are hooded like masks. We know now that there were foreign fighters arrested by HTS.

00:17:17 Speaker_21
Yesterday they've set fire on a Christmas tree, but immediately HTS arrived to assure people to calm them down that they're going to be arrested. We've seen also video of an HTS leader holding the cross in solidarity with the Christians.

00:17:31 Speaker_21
So I think this is a very critical period of time because there has been robbing, there has been, you know, some people went into a church also saying that, you know, they want to destroy it, but then HTS arrived and stopped them from doing any harm.

00:18:03 Speaker_21
I think there are many people who want to take advantage of the situation to destabilize the country, to make people afraid of the new leadership, especially because HTS had links with Al-Qaeda in the past and they are seen as the Muslim Brotherhood who want to force an Islamic rule inside Syria, something they've been denying and they've been giving assurances that they are here to protect the Syrian, you know, mosaic of different groups.

00:18:20 Speaker_21
But there will be, and I think there will be continuous, you know, these kind of attacks that needs more control from the new leadership, but also more awareness from the people on the ground to know who are the perpetrators and more collaboration between the civil people and the new government to stop these attacks from Lena Sinjab.

00:18:30 Speaker_10
The government in Hong Kong has issued another round of arrest warrants and bounties for six activists living overseas.

00:18:39 Speaker_10
It's the third time the authorities have offered rewards for help capturing people alleged to have violated the city's strict national security laws. I heard more from our Asia Pacific editor, Mickey Bristow.

00:18:50 Speaker_12
Firstly, as you mentioned there, they've issued wanted notices for six additional activists who are abroad. and they say are betraying the country, continuing to lobby for democratic change in Hong Kong from outside of the territory. The reward or the bounty is one million Hong Kong dollars.

00:19:06 Speaker_12
That's about 130,000 US dollars. It's also, the authorities in Hong Kong have also taken extra measures against people. They've also issued bounties for previously, there's now a total of 19 people.

00:19:21 Speaker_12
What they've also done is cancel the passports for seven

00:19:32 Speaker_12
people they've already issued wanted posters for, and they've also issued measures against, to try and crack down on anyone helping these people abroad, on the finances of these people in Hong Kong, and other measures, including, for example, cancelling the professional qualifications for some of these people. who the Hong Kong authorities say have undermined national security.

00:19:52 Speaker_10
So how likely is it that these people, the targets of these warrants, will end up being sent back? Not very likely.

00:19:59 Speaker_12
These people live in countries outside of China, outside of Hong Kong. They live in Canada, the United States and Britain primarily, where they're allowed and encouraged, really, just to continue their pro-democracy work in Hong Kong. It's unlikely that any of these nations are going to send them back.

00:20:18 Speaker_12
to Hong Kong or China to face any kind of charge because these countries and the people engaged in this kind of activity simply believe that it's ordinary democratic activity, the kind of thing that you can do in open and free societies.

00:20:33 Speaker_12
It's only in Hong Kong which they narrowly define these activities of undermining national security. As I said elsewhere, it just be considered ordinary political discourse and to and fro. So they're not going to be sent back. So briefly, why are the authorities doing this? It's a good question.

00:20:48 Speaker_10
Why are they doing it if they're not going to get back?

00:20:54 Speaker_12
It's partly because they want to continue to essentially tell the population that already that still lives in Hong Kong, that national security and cracking down on rights and freedoms, as they've done over the last four years, is still very important. It's about publicity as much as anything.

00:21:08 Speaker_12
They know they're not going to get these people back, but they don't want anyone in Hong Kong now be tempted to kind of engage in pro-democracy activity. Mickey Bristow.

00:21:19 Speaker_10
Two crew members are missing in the Mediterranean Sea after a Russian cargo ship sank. The Foreign Ministry said the Ursa Major went down in international waters between Spain and Algeria after an onboard explosion. I spoke to the defence analyst Jonathan Marcus.

00:21:36 Speaker_08
Well, I think it raises all sorts of questions about the maintenance, the seamanship, the safety procedures of much of Russia's merchant fleet. This particular vessel, the Ursa Major, is a general cargo vessel.

00:21:51 Speaker_08
It's been a mainstay of the shuttle operations between Russia and the Russian port of Tartus in Syria, where the Russians have a small naval base. So it looks as though, we're told, there was an explosion in the engine room.

00:22:06 Speaker_08
It may well have turned around trying to get back home, and obviously, as you say, it's gone down in international waters between Spain and Algeria. Luckily, most of the crew were taken off, but sadly a couple of them, I think, were probably lost.

00:22:22 Speaker_10
And there are reports, not reports we've been able to verify, but there are reports out there suggesting it may have been carrying Russian military equipment. Yes, it's not sure that I think it was carrying Russian military equipment.

00:22:31 Speaker_08
I mean, obviously, it looked as though it was inbound towards Tartus, so the Russians wouldn't accept it.

00:22:40 Speaker_08
What it did have on board, on the deck that you can clearly see in video images, are two large crawler cranes.

00:22:49 Speaker_08
And some speculation is that these cranes were being taken to Tartus, where they could have been put on the quayside and helped to load heavy Russian equipment onto the vessel. Because something we do know for sure is that this ship was on an international sanctions list.

00:23:02 Speaker_10
Yes, it was.

00:23:07 Speaker_08
It was owned by a company called Oberon Logistica, which we believe is owned itself by the Russian Ministry of Defense.

00:23:17 Speaker_08
So it was sanctioned on those grounds alone because of broad sanctions relating to Russia's illegal invasion of Ukraine.

00:23:26 Speaker_08
Of course, the broader problem with the so-called Russian Shadow Fleet, as it's known – the Gray Fleet, the Black Fleet, as some people call it – This is actually an attempt to evade sanctions on Russia's oil exports.

00:23:50 Speaker_10
It was the most powerful storm to strike Mayotte in at least 90 years.

00:23:53 Speaker_10
It's still not clear what the final fatality figure might be, but the French Prime Minister, François Bayrou, said deaths would be in the dozens, not thousands, dismissing the higher figure as alarmist.

00:24:06 Speaker_10
France, which owns the territory, has come in for criticism for not responding quickly enough. Last week, the BBC heard recorded testimony from a local businesswoman, Rouhaina Kamardine, who lives on the west of the island. Here in Mayotte, everything is devastated.

00:24:19 Speaker_13
Landscapes, houses, trees, everything is destroyed. Now that the cyclone has passed, we have no service in some parts of the island. We have no running water, no electricity.

00:24:37 Speaker_13
We know we're facing really hard times of hunger coming ahead of us because We really have no trees that can give food for the next six months, if not the next year.

00:24:51 Speaker_10
Well, today Ruhaina Kamardin spoke to us again, thanks to a satellite internet service provided by a local businessman to help people affected by the disaster. My colleague Rob Young asked her how things were going.

00:25:05 Speaker_13
Well, people have organized all around the island and those who are fortunate enough to have power back and to have the ability to get a connection from Starlink are generous enough to open their doors to people who need connection to communicate with the outer world. That's the satellite internet service which is owned by Elon Musk, isn't it?

00:25:24 Speaker_05
So what is it like now in terms of the other services? We heard you telling us about what you didn't have in that clip from a week ago. What is back on? Well water is starting to come back.

00:25:36 Speaker_13
Now we have water like for eight hours every other day. Service is back for some operators but not for everybody and it's very very unstable.

00:25:50 Speaker_13
Power is back in some parts of the island but many many cables are lying on the floor because of the trees that have fallen down on them. So it takes time to rebuild, to reconnect everything.

00:26:03 Speaker_13
And so there's much solidarity because people move and you can charge your phone at the neighbours if they have power.

00:26:12 Speaker_13
It's becoming easier, but it's very, very, I think I read something like 30% of the island have power back and only 27% have water back. So it's very slow. So what are people who don't have water doing?

00:26:28 Speaker_13
Well, they go to the rivers in some parts of the island. They have to drive for kilometers, like 20-30 kilometers to find them because there are places where you can get water because all year long we don't have water every day.

00:26:43 Speaker_13
So there are places where you can get water if you didn't have time to collect water in your house prior to it being cut, if I can say it like that.

00:26:53 Speaker_13
So people move, they drive kilometres to get some water to bring back home, or they go to rivers, which is very unsafe. They do whatever they can to get water, but it's very, very, very complicated. And how was your home? Did it survive the cyclone?

00:27:08 Speaker_05
Well, I'm lucky enough because my home did survive.

00:27:12 Speaker_13
I lost the rooftop, but I still have a home and we're organizing to have it repaired. So I think I'm among the lucky ones.

00:27:28 Speaker_10
For many children at this time of year, it's become a tradition to follow the progress of Father Christmas around the world using a tracker provided by the North American aerospace organisation NORAD.

00:27:41 Speaker_10
It monitors Santa's departure from the North Pole on his mission to deliver presents to those who've been good. But how does it actually work? Sophie Williams caught up with the team behind the tracker.

00:27:57 Speaker_22
This is the heart of the North American Aerospace Defense Command phone room. But today, they're tracking a certain man in red. NORAD Santa Tracker, as it's known, has been keeping children up to date with Santa's whereabouts for almost 70 years.

00:28:18 Speaker_22
By calling the hotline or checking the tracker website, children can see his current location and make sure they're tucked in bed for his arrival. But according to Colonel Mark LaChapelle, the tradition started by accident.

00:28:31 Speaker_02
Yes, so 69 years ago, a misprint in a local newspaper really caused the start of what we know today as Noratraxana.

00:28:39 Speaker_02
A young child called in to the operations centre and asked some questions about Santa and luckily the colonel on duty responded with all the right answers for the child and directed the crew to continue to do that if more children called in and so 69 years later we're still doing it.

00:28:55 Speaker_02
We use a combination of radar satellites and then of course we use our fighter aircraft to escort him through our airspace. Through all those systems together we're able to watch him, make sure he's safe and sound going around the world. More than 400,000 people call the NORAD phone line every year.

00:29:12 Speaker_02
They ask a lot about the reindeer and they ask what their Christmas gifts are going to be. Kind of have to tell them that Santa doesn't tell us, but you know a lot of really good questions that are sometimes very hard to answer.

00:29:23 Speaker_22
Colonel La Chapelle has been taking part for eight years now, and has seen the operation grow. The NORAD tracker now operates in a number of languages, including Korean, Chinese, German, Italian and Spanish.

00:29:37 Speaker_10
Sophie Williams with that report, and you can check whether Santa is near your house, just Google Santa Tracker. And that's all from us for now, but there'll be a new edition of the Global News Podcast later.

00:29:55 Speaker_10
If you want to comment on this podcast or the topics covered in it, you can send us an email. The address is globalpodcast at bbc.co.uk. This edition was mixed by Sid Dondon and the producer was Richard Hamilton. The editor is Karen Martin. I'm Alex Ritson. Happy Christmas and until next time, goodbye.

00:30:26 Speaker_04
For just as long as Hollywood has been Tinseltown, there have been suspicions about what lurks behind the glitz and glamour.

00:30:34 Speaker_09
Concerns about radical propaganda in the motion pictures. And for a while, those suspicions grew into something much bigger and much darker.

00:30:40 Speaker_00
Are you a member of the Communist Party?

00:30:43 Speaker_04
Or have you ever been a member of the Communist Party?

00:30:47 Speaker_10
I'm Una Chaplin, and this is Hollywood Exiles.

00:30:53 Speaker_01
It's about a battle for the political soul of America, and the battlefield was Hollywood.

00:30:58 Speaker_04
All episodes of Hollywood Exiles from the BBC World Service and CBC are available now. Search for Hollywood Exiles wherever you get your podcasts.