June 15, 2020 - Triple-Teaming a Black Hole

Triple-Teaming a Black Hole  Black holes may be incredibly enigmatic, but even they yield their secrets when examined by a team of expert interrogators. Three cutting-edge telescopes joined forces to produce this spectacular image of Centaurus A, a galaxy about 13 million light-years away that harbors a supermassive black hole at its core. The Atacama Pathfinder Experiment submillimeter telescope shows jets and lobes powered by the black hole as orange. The space-based Chandra Observatory’s X-ray data is in blue. Visible light data from the Max-Planck/ESO 2.2-meter telescope shows the dust lane in the galaxy and background stars. The X-ray jet in the upper left extends for about 13,000 light-years away from the black hole. Material in the jet is traveling at about half the speed of light.

Image credit: X-ray: NASA / CXC / CfA / R.Kraft et al.; Submillimeter: MPIfR / ESO / APEX / A.Weiss et al.; Optical: ESO / WFI

Weekly Calendar

June 15 - 21, 2020

Holidays - Sky Events - Space History

 

Monday 15

1971: First Titan III-D rocket launch
2010: Soyuz TMA-19 launched carrying ISS Expedition 24/25 crew

Tuesday 16

Uranus 4° north of Moon

1963: Vostok 6 launched; Valentina Tereshkova first woman in space, still the only solo spaceflight by a woman
2012: Shenzhou 9 launched, fourth Chinese human space flight

Wednesday 17

Mercury stationary

1985: STS-51G Discovery launched

Thursday 18

1799: William Lassell born
1983: STS-7 Challenger launched; Sally Ride becomes first American woman in space
2009: Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter (LRO) and Lunar Crater Observation and Sensing Satellite (LCROSS) launched

Friday 19

Venus 0.7° south of Moon

1999: QuikSCAT launched

Saturday 20

Solstice 5:44 PM ET

1985: NASA announces cola wars will take place on shuttle mission STS-51F
1996: STS-78 Columbia launched

Sunday 21

Father's Day

New Moon 2:41 AM ET

1993: STS-57 Endeavour launched
2004: SpaceShipOne launched, first privately-funded human space flight