Massive Black Hole Devours Star 77
H3xx writes "Astronomers have observed a black hole shredding a star and sending a powerful beam of energy toward Earth. When it was first observed on March 28th by the Swift spacecraft, it was thought to be the implosion of an aging star, but is now believed to be the result of a star wandering too close to a black hole, imploding and converting 10% of the star's mass into gamma radiation. The energy burst is still visible by telescope more than two-and-a-half months later, the researchers report in the journal Science."
Re:Harmful? (Score:4, Interesting)
Redshift of 0.3 or so. Corresponds to a luminosity distance of almost 2 gigaparsecs. That's pretty far away.
Also, those gamma rays are all observed above the atmosphere. Interesting and totally off-topic aside, gamma ray bursters were only observed when we started putting military satellites in orbit to check on nuclear development. There were all these high-intensity sources around, leading to an investigation as to whether the Soviets had any new technology. Eventually it was determined that, no, they didn't and that these sources were extremely far away.
Re:Naaaa. not gonn happen like this (Score:4, Interesting)
I personally dont believe that its possible for a star to be "elongated" and stretched..
If a star [hubblesite.org] can contort itself into odd shapes, what makes you think a black hole can't stretch one out of shape?