The James Webb Space Telescope Is About To Launch

Short Wave

NPR

Science, Life Sciences, News, Nature, Daily News, Astronomy

4.7 • 6.5K Ratings

🗓️ 17 December 2021

⏱️ 14 minutes

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Summary

Soon the highly anticipated James Webb Space Telescope will blast off into space, hurtling almost a million miles away from Earth, where it will orbit the Sun. Decades in the making, scientists hope its mission will last a decade and provide insights into all kinds of things, including the early formation of galaxies just after the Big Bang.

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Transcript

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0:00.0	You're listening to Shortwave from NPR.
0:04.6	Hey everybody, this is Rebecca Ramirez and here at Shortwave we are incredibly excited
0:11.6	about NASA's James Webb Space Telescope.
0:14.4	Now today is Friday, December 17th and the launch was supposed to be next Wednesday but
0:21.0	it's been delayed and today NASA should update us on a timeline.
0:26.7	Regardless of when it launches, this telescope will be the most powerful ever put into space.
0:33.6	It costs about $10 billion and it should be able to do some really amazing feats.
0:40.0	Like see some of the earliest galaxies in the universe or search the atmospheres of planets
0:44.9	beyond our solar system for signs of possible light.
0:47.9	Exactly.
0:48.9	All of this is assuming of course that it doesn't just blow up on the launch pad.
0:52.0	Okay, that's NPR science correspondent Nell Greenfield boys with a cheery thought as always.
0:58.8	Hi Nell.
0:59.8	Hey Rebecca.
1:00.8	So Nell, you've been reporting on the James Webb Space Telescope.
1:04.3	How do astronomers feel?
1:05.9	I mean, this is a huge moment for science.
1:08.7	So are they, you know, as cheery as you are clearly?
1:12.4	I was talking to Neil Reed.
1:14.0	He's an astronomer at the Space Telescope Science Institute in Baltimore and I asked him to
1:18.6	rank his terror level on a scale of one to 10 with 10 being maximum terror.
1:25.4	And he said it really varied, but at that moment, it's seven and rising.
	...

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