‘Astronomers find closest black hole to Earth, hiding in plain sight’
6 May 2020
15:00
The Milky Way galaxy is thought to contain hundreds of millions of black holes. But only a few dozen have revealed themselves—through the x-ray glow of hot gases that surround them. Now, astronomers have found a “dark” black hole only 1000 light years away from Earth—just down the road in galactic terms. It is the closest black hole to our planet ever found, in a star system that is visible to the naked eye. “They have good evidence,” says Todd Thompson, an astronomer at Ohio State University. “I believe them.”
