Massive Star Burps, Then Explodes

gollum123 writes with a link to the Berkley site about an impressive star explosion that took place some tens of millions of years ago. We first caught sight of it in 2004, when there was a bright outburst, ahead of a massive supernova. "All the observations suggest that the supernova's blast wave took only a few weeks to reach the shell of material ejected two years earlier, which did not have time to drift very far from the star. As the wave smashed into the ejecta, it heated the gas to millions of degrees, hot enough to emit copious X-rays. The Swift satellite saw the supernova continue to brighten in X-rays for 100 days, something that has never been seen before in a supernova. All supernovae previously observed in X-rays have started off bright and then quickly faded to invisibility."

supernova burps

[Uksi (68751)]

Interesting older article [findarticles.com] on supernova burps.

Re:supernova burps

[by Anonymous Coward]

In other news, Uranus farts, then soils it's rings. Details at 11.

The question that leaves me with is...

[jimstapleton (999106)]

I wonder what it ate? I hope it wasn't the fish...

Re:

[darjen (879890)]

I wonder what it ate? I hope it wasn't the fish...

And there's no mention of it saying "excuse me" afterwards. I guess a little politeness is too much to ask from an exploding star...

Re:The question that leaves me with is...

[Trails (629752)]

The star exploded after eating a mint. This surprised most astronomers, since the mint was wafer thin.

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[Columcille (88542)]

some of that tainted dog food, I'm sure.

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[dkleinsc (563838)]

No, if you eat fish for dinner, this is what happens, as described by Dr Rumack:

It starts with a slight fever and dryness of the throat. When the virus penetrates the red blood cells, the victim becomes dizzy begins to experience an itchy rash, then the poison goes to work on the central nervous system, severe muscle spasms followed by the inevitable drooling. At this point, the entire digestive system collapses accompanied by uncontrollable flatulence until finally, the poor bastard is reduced to a quiveri

How do we know it wasnt a fart?

[krbvroc1 (725200)]

Did the White House force the scientists to change their qualified 'fart' into a 'burb'? Investigations are needed.

Also, is there a term for Astronomers such as the one we use called 'Anthropomorphism?'

Re:

[krbvroc1 (725200)]

How is this a troll? Its supposed to be funny. All these Astronomers describe their 'work product' with Antrhopomorphic terms, add 'pretty colors' to their space images, etc. Apparently you guys have no sense of humor either!

Title misleading.

[morgan_greywolf (835522)]

Phew. Before I RTFA'd, I thought they were talking about Rosie O'Donnell....

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[Randolpho (628485)]

Phew. Before I RTFA'd, I thought they were talking about Rosie O'Donnell....

This is Slashdot, not Fark!

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[morgan_greywolf (835522)]

If only we'd be so lucky.

Be careful of what you wish for. I highly recommend [myspace.com] renting the movie "Ghostbusters".

But monsieur....

[qazxswedc (821424)]

It's just a wafer-thin mint!

Re:

[treeves (963993)]

Bring me another bucket!

Eta Carinae Next?

[ackthpt (218170)]

Eta Carinae [wikipedia.org] could go any time and it's only 7,500 to 8,000 LY away.

Re:Eta Carinae Next?

[by Anonymous Coward]

You mean it could have gone any time? I mean, if it exploded 7000 years ago we'd still not have seen the explosion, and wouldn't for another several hundred years.

Re:

[ackthpt (218170)]

You mean it could have gone any time? I mean, if it exploded 7000 years ago we'd still not have seen the explosion, and wouldn't for another several hundred years.

This is true. When we look up into the night sky we see history, not the present -- where stars, galaxies, globular clusters, nebulae, et al, were at their respective lightspeed/distance relative distances.

In any event, when the various wavelengths of light and radiation get here will we survive? An event like this could have played a rol

Re:Eta Carinae Next?

[alienmole (15522)]

By all estimates I've seen, we're safe from Eta Carinae going nova. See e.g. Earth likely spared from one form of cosmic doom [nasa.gov] (NASA), which says that a supernova would need to be within 26 light years of Earth to cause significant damage.

Re:Eta Carinae Next?

[operagost (62405)]

You mean it could have gone at any time...

Re:

[ajs (35943)]

You mean it could have gone at any time...

Not exactly. It could go at any time implies a time in the present or future. What you said implies any time at all. We know that it didn't happen more than 7,500 years ago (since that's the light we see).

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[MobileTatsu-NJG (946591)]

"You mean it could have gone at any time..."

It hasn't happened until we know it has happened.

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[Cervantes (612861)]

It hasn't happened until we know it has happened.

So, if I shoot your mother, she isn't dead until the cops call you?

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[MobileTatsu-NJG (946591)]

"So, if I shoot your mother, she isn't dead until the cops call you?"

Consider that example yourself, for a moment. Your world hasn't changed until the news has arrived. Think of it another way: Is your neighbor alive right now? He could be. He probably is. He may not be. You really couldn't say that he is or isn't already dead. To put it another way: The odds of his survival are in his favor, but they become 1 in 1 when you find out the outcome.

Think about it. :P

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[Cervantes (612861)]

Consider that example yourself, for a moment. Your world hasn't changed until the news has arrived. Think of it another way: Is your neighbor alive right now? He could be. He probably is. He may not be. You really couldn't say that he is or isn't already dead. To put it another way: The odds of his survival are in his favor, but they become 1 in 1 when you find out the outcome.

Think about it. :P

Ah, but you're arguing a different outlook on the universe. It's been a long time since I took my philosophy class

This happens to me all the time..

[Cristofori42 (1001206)]

4) The star finally runs out of fuel and the core collapses

That's like a segmentation fault right?

Re:This happens to me all the time..

[Anon-Admin (443764)]

Sounds more like a core dump.

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[x2A (858210)]

No you're thinking of uranus.

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[e4g4 (533831)]

Seems to me to be more like a laptop carrying a Sony lithium ion battery.

The battery runs down, then....BOOM!

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[jcuervo (715139)]

LOOK! A 7-DIGIT UID!

It's more like...

[DeadCatX2 (950953)]

..a stack overflow.

Oops

[aktzin (882293)]

Is this what Sir Arthur C. Clarke meant when he said that supernovae may be "industrial accidents"?

That's what I call old news.

[tanguyr (468371)]

...impressive star explosion that took place some tens of millions of years ago...

Oooooooold news!

Well...

[Overzeetop (214511)]

...this is slashdot, after all.

Burps, then Explodes?

[wildsurf (535389)]

"After dinner mint, sir?" [wikipedia.org]

"Oh, I couldn't eat another bite..." [youtube.com]

Massive star burps, explodes...

[diesel66 (254283)]

I really don't know if I'd call Rosie O'Donnell a star...

At least I can start watching The View again. (Oh, boy!)

Ejecta, eh?

[bubbl07 (777082)]

As the wave smashed into the ejecta, it heated the gas to millions of degrees, hot enough to emit copious X-rays.

Strange, that usually happens when my ejecta smashes into something else, not the other way around...

Oh wait...

Intriguing Alternate Possibilities

[StefanJ (88986)]

[ ] G'Thak Meld testing out new nova bomb. Gas / dust shell was actually a cloud of mothballed habitats and light collectors towed to the system to see how blast would effect a dyson shphere.

[ ] Elder Race equivalent of Jackson Pollock at work.

[ ] Young Earth creationists are right; like anything more distant that 6,000 LY, this was actually elaborate illusion created by God.

[ ] Extremem upper limit of Mentos / Diet Pepsi reaction now known.

Stefan

Download The MacGuffin Alphabet [sjgames.com].

Last seen heading towards the back door

[Alzheimers (467217)]

...Malcom McDowell whistles innocently, and tries to slip out the backdoor and through Nexus unnoticed.

Wow... and damn

[zappepcs (820751)]

I read the headline and thought this was going to be a John Candy story...

Re:

[Kozz (7764)]

Hey! John Candy is dead. You should have said Chris Farley, instead.

What? oh... nevermind.

Is that you...

[ehrichweiss (706417)]

Tom Cruise?

Huh?

[SirKron (112214)]

about an impressive star explosion that took place some tens of millions of years ago

But my priest told me God made the universe 10,000 years ago. How can that be? Maybe it exploded in the universe we had previous to ours, you know, the one with the dinosaurs.

Re:Huh?

[Farmer Tim (530755)]

Before you try to critisize a religion or hell even a topic you should at least have some understanding of it.

And hurtling towards us from the decaying supernova remnants is a probe with a single mysterious inscription on the side:

"You must be new here."

waferthinmint

[brian0918 (638904)]

I nominate this for besttagever. And if anyone is wondering what it refers to, first hand over your honorary nerd badge, and then watch this [youtube.com].

the plans

[f1055man (951955)]

for the hyperspace bypass have been on public display for some time now. They should have taken a greater interest in galactic affairs.

-----
am I strange for wondering if I'm being callous?

Re:

[Akaihiryuu (786040)]

Because it *did* happen that long ago. It just took the light from the supernova that long to reach us, so that we could see it.

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[jcuervo (715139)]

Because it *did* happen that long ago. It just took the light from the supernova that long to reach us, so that we could see it.

But then, didn't it not happen that long ago until the light reached us, or something?

Re:

[exp(pi*sqrt(163)) (613870)]

Given that all inertial frames are equally good, why not just pick the one that's popular with readers of the article? Seems fair to me, after all you need some coordinate system if you're going to communicate physics. In fact, I'm a bit confused by what you mean by "the one that actually makes a tiny bit of sense". The only one I can think of is an inertial frame of the supernova itself. In that frame, here and now is also tens of millions of years later than when the supernova happened. But maybe you have

Re:

[Scarletdown (886459)]

Of course, the mission would have to be carried out at night so they don't burn up.

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[Rick Genter (315800)]

I did a little calculating. At 10 million miles per hour, that means the pieces of the star are traveling at about 15 times the speed of light.

You did your calculations wrong.

c is approximately 186,282 miles per second. That translates to over 670 million miles per hour. 10 million miles per hour is only about 1.5% of lightspeed.