A rare crash at the Milky Way’s core: U-Michigan astronomers could be the first to see it
ANN ARBOR — University of Michigan astronomers could be the first to witness a rare collision expected to happen at the center of the galaxy by spring.
With NASA’s orbiting Swift telescope, the U-M team is taking daily images of a mysterious gas cloud about three times the mass of Earth that’s spiraling toward the supermassive black hole at the Milky Way’s core. From our vantage point, the core lies more than 25,000 light years away in the southern summer sky near the constellations Sagittarius and Scorpius. (more…)