🚀 Space Pulse · 2026-06-20 22:01 UTC

SPACE PULSE

Saturday, June 21, 2026 | Your daily space and astronomy briefing

⚡ TL;DR

A NASA aircraft carrying the Swift Boost satellite departed Wallops Flight Facility on June 19, marking a critical step toward reboosting the Swift Observatory to a higher orbit. A busy late-June launch calendar is stacking up fast, with SpaceX, Rocket Lab, Isar, and ESA all targeting the final days of the month.

🚀 LAUNCHES

NEXT UP: STARLINK GROUP 17-28

• SpaceX Falcon 9 Block 5 is go for launch carrying 24 Starlink satellites, targeting June 21 at 15:12 UTC. ^[1]

LONG MARCH 7A MYSTERY PAYLOAD

• China Aerospace Science and Technology Corporation targets June 23 at 02:10 UTC for an undisclosed payload aboard Long March 7A. ^[2]

STARLINK GROUP 17-40

• Another SpaceX Falcon 9 batch of 24 Starlink satellites is go for launch, targeting June 28 at 14:00 UTC. ^[3]

STARLINK GROUP 17-45

• SpaceX Falcon 9 is go for yet another 24-satellite Starlink batch, targeting June 25 at 02:48 UTC. ^[4]

ELECTRON DOUBLE-HEADER FOR JAPANESE SAR OPERATORS

• Rocket Lab Electron is set to fly the iQPS SAR satellite on mission "The Grain Goddess Provides" (iQPS Launch 7) targeting late June. ^[5]
• A separate Rocket Lab Electron is slated for Synspective's StriX-10 SAR satellite on mission "Ten Owl Of Ten," also targeting late June. ^[6]

ESA THEMIS DEMONSTRATOR HOP TEST

• ESA's Themis reusable rocket demonstrator is targeting its first low-altitude hop test, T1H-1, up to 100 m, with a window opening June 30. ^[7]

ISAR AEROSPACE SPECTRUM SECOND TEST FLIGHT

• Isar Aerospace's Spectrum rocket targets a second test flight carrying 5 ESA Boost! program cubesats including CyBEEsat (TU Berlin) and TriSat-S (University of Maribor), window opening June 30. ^[8]

DEEP BLUE AEROSPACE NEBULA-1 DEMO

• Chinese startup Deep Blue Aerospace plans a sub-orbital first test flight of its Nebula-1 rocket, targeting around June 30. ^[9]

GLOBALSTAR 2-R MISSION 1

• SpaceX Falcon 9 is slated to launch 9 Globalstar 2-R replacement satellites to a 1,410 km orbit inclined at 52 degrees, targeting late June. ^[10]

SIRIUS SXM-11

• SpaceX Falcon 9 will launch SiriusXM's 12th high-powered digital audio radio satellite SXM-11, built by Lanteris Space on the IM-1300 platform, targeting late June.

🔭 DISCOVERIES

SWIFT BOOST MISSION UNDERWAY

• A NASA aircraft departed Wallops Flight Facility, Virginia on June 19 carrying a rocket loaded with the Swift Boost satellite, a robotic spacecraft designed to raise the Swift Observatory to a higher orbit and extend its operational life.

EXOPLANET MAGNETIC FIELD HINTS FROM STRANGE WINDS

• ESO VLT and Gemini North measured wind speeds on seven ultra-hot Jupiter-class exoplanets and found the strongest evidence yet that some exoplanets may host magnetic fields, revealed through anomalous wind patterns.

TWO PLANETS FORMING AROUND YOUNG STAR WISPIT 2

• Using ESO telescopes, astronomers confirmed a second forming planet in the protoplanetary disc around young star WISPIT 2, offering a rare live snapshot of a solar system assembling itself.

MYSTERY SHOCK WAVE AROUND A DEAD STAR

• ESO VLT imaged an unexpected shock wave around a stellar remnant, a discovery described by the team as surprising given current models of how dead stars interact with their surroundings.

ALMA LARGEST EVER IMAGE REVEALS MILKY WAY HEART CHEMISTRY

• ALMA produced its largest image to date, covering the central region of the Milky Way in a dense network of gas filaments, opening a new window into the hidden chemical complexity at the galaxy's core.

NEW FU ORIONIS OUTBURST DETECTED NEAR NGC 6589

• Astronomers identified a new FU Orionis-type accretion outburst, V7995 Sgr, which peaked in late 2024 after a steep 4.6-month photometric rise of 2.85 magnitudes in the r-band near nebulae NGC 6589 and 6590.

PULSATIONS CANDIDATE FROM ULTRALUMINOUS X-RAY SOURCE NGC 7456 ULX-1

• Using XMM-Newton 2023 data, researchers found a candidate pulsation signal at approximately 0.22 Hz from NGC 7456 ULX-1, hinting the source may harbor a neutron star rather than a black hole.

🛰️ MISSIONS

HAYABUSA2 TORIFUNE FLYBY DATE CONFIRMED

• JAXA confirmed the date and time for Hayabusa2's flyby of asteroid Torifune, keeping the extended mission on track following the spacecraft's historic Ryugu sample return.

JAXA AND ESA SIGN APOPHIS COOPERATION AGREEMENT

• JAXA and ESA formalized cooperation on ESA's RAMSES asteroid mission targeting Apophis, and concluded a broader Memorandum of Cooperation on planetary defence, signed in Berlin on May 7.

ESA EUROCOM AND ASTRONAUT COMMS HIGHLIGHTED

• ESA published a 23-minute feature on the EUROCOM team at the European Astronaut Centre in Cologne, which serves as the voice link between ISS crews including ESA astronaut Sophie Adenot and ground controllers.

H3 FLIGHT 6 TEST VEHICLE SUCCESSFULLY LAUNCHED

• JAXA successfully launched the H3 Launch Vehicle flight No. 6, 30-configuration test vehicle on June 12 after a postponement from the originally planned June 10 date.

KIBOCUBE ROUND 9 TEAMS SELECTED

• JAXA and the UN Office for Outer Space Affairs selected teams from El Salvador and Thailand for the ninth round of the KiboCUBE program, which deploys small satellites from the ISS Kibo module.

POET SOLAR TELESCOPE ACHIEVES FIRST LIGHT AT PARANAL

• ESO's Paranal Solar ESPRESSO Telescope, PoET, achieved first light at the Paranal site in Chile on April 9, and will work alongside the ESPRESSO spectrograph to study the Sun as a proxy for exoplanet host stars.

CTAO SOUTHERN ARRAY CONSTRUCTION BEGINS AT PARANAL

• A groundbreaking ceremony on December 18, 2025 launched construction of the Cherenkov Telescope Array Observatory southern array at ESO Paranal, set to become the world's largest gamma-ray observatory.

ARCTIC SEA ICE HITS RECORD LOW IN 2026

• JAXA satellite microwave radiometer data confirmed that Arctic winter sea-ice extent reached a new record low annual maximum in 2026, continuing a long-term declining trend.

☀️ SPACE WEATHER

TYPE II RADIO EMISSION DETECTED, THEN CLARIFIED

• NOAA SWPC issued an alert at 04:03 UTC on June 20 for a Type II radio emission beginning at 03:00 UTC, associated with a shock wave propagating at an estimated 300 km/s, a potential signal of a coronal mass ejection.
• NOAA cancelled the initial alert (serial 1504) minutes later at 04:06 UTC as a duplicate, then reissued a fresh Type II alert (serial 1506) at 04:07 UTC confirming the 300 km/s shock event was genuine.
• No geomagnetic storm scale rating was assigned in the available alerts; sky watchers should monitor SWPC for follow-up watches if the associated CME is Earth-directed.

📄 RESEARCH

HUBBLE TENSION AT TEN YEARS: STILL UNRESOLVED

• A comprehensive decade review on arXiv finds the discrepancy between early-Universe (CMB-based) and late-Universe (distance ladder) measurements of the Hubble constant has only grown, with no Standard Model explanation yet confirmed.

WARM JUPITERS TOI-2147b AND TOI-6019b CHARACTERIZED

• Using TESS photometry and the MaHPS spectrograph, astronomers detected and characterized two new eccentric warm Jupiters with orbital periods between 10 and 200 days, adding to the diverse architecture census of giant planet systems.

SUB-NEPTUNE ATMOSPHERES SHAPED BY BUILDING-BLOCK COMPOSITION

• Linking recent JWST detections of CH4 and CO2 in sub-Neptune atmospheres to planetary formation models, a new arXiv paper shows whether a planet formed from rock, water ice, or refractory carbon (soot) strongly determines its eventual atmospheric chemistry.

NEUTRON STAR BIRTH KICKS SHOW BIMODAL DISTRIBUTION

• Analysis of roughly 200 isolated radio pulsars confirms that neutron stars receive natal velocity kicks falling into two distinct populations at birth, with implications for binary star evolution and gravitational wave source rates.

GALAXY CLUSTER ABELL 2142 MERGER SHOCK MAPPED IN RADIO AND X-RAY

• Using XMM-Newton, researchers detected a merger shock on the northwest side of massive cluster Abell 2142, tracing it with newly identified radio arcs and ultra-long radio tails from infalling galaxies, probing the energetics of the ongoing collision.

SKA SCIENCE CASE VOLUME II RELEASED

• The Square Kilometre Array community published Advancing Astrophysics with the SKA II on arXiv, outlining transformative science goals now that SKA construction is underway, covering cosmology, transients, magnetism, and astrobiology.

MOON FORMATION THEORY GETS A VISCOSITY TWIST

• A new giant impact simulation shows that modeling Theia as a high-viscosity impactor and the proto-Earth as low-viscosity better reproduces the isotopic similarities between Earth and Moon, addressing a long-standing puzzle in lunar origin theory.

That is your Space Pulse for June 21, 2026. Clear skies and keep looking up.

📎 Sources

1. Falcon 9 Block 5 | Starlink Group 17-28 — Launch Library 2
2. Long March 7A | Unknown Payload — Launch Library 2
3. Falcon 9 Block 5 | Starlink Group 17-40 — Launch Library 2
4. Falcon 9 Block 5 | Starlink Group 17-45 — Launch Library 2
5. Electron | The Grain Goddess Provides (iQPS Launch 7) — Launch Library 2
6. Electron | Ten Owl Of Ten (StriX Launch 10) — Launch Library 2
7. Themis Demonstrator | T1H-1 — Launch Library 2
8. Spectrum | Onward and Upward — Launch Library 2
9. Nebula-1 | Demo Flight — Launch Library 2
10. Falcon 9 Block 5 | Globalstar 2-R Mission 1 (x 9) — Launch Library 2

Curated from official sources — NASA/ESA/JAXA/ESO/NOAA/arXiv/Launch Library. Informational only.
Serial 20260620-22-v7 · 2026-06-20 22:01 UTC