SA telescope discovers new galaxy, and trouble for flight prices

Here’s what is happening and affecting South Africa today:

New galaxy discovery: The Karoo-based MeerKAT telescope has discovered a new galaxy 32 times the size of Earth’s galaxy. It was dubbed Inkathazo, the isiXhosa and isiZulu word for “trouble” because its physics is difficult for scientists to understand. [TimesLive]

Sky high flight costs: If Flysafair ends up being grounded due to the dispute over its ownership structure, flight ticket prices could skyrocket. This is because there are too few seats already, largely because of the bankruptcy of Kulula operator Comair. [MyBroadband]

Weathering cyber breach: The South African Weather Service (SAWS) has fallen victim to a cyberattack on Sunday evening. This has impacted the SAWS’s daily services to aviation and seafaring operations. As a precaution, SAWS has taken its website and email system offline. [Times Live]

Stats SA defends data: Stats SA head Risenga Maluleke defends the integrity of Census 2022 data, as well as SA’s GDP number. This is despite expert concerns about Stats SA overestimating the population by 1 million people as well as the shocking and inexplicable third quarter agricultural sector GDP shrinking. [News24]

Markets: The South African rand was little changed on Tuesday, a day after sinking in a sharp global selloff linked to advances by Chinese artificial intelligence (AI) startup DeepSeek. On Wednesday (29 January), the rand was trading at R18.66/USD, R23.24/GBP and R19.48/EUR. Oil is trading under $77.33 a barrel.