The Milky Way's Most Recent Supernova That Nobody Saw

StartsWithABang writes: A little over 300 years ago, a supernova — a dying, ultramassive star — exploded, giving rise to such a luminous explosion that it might have shone as bright as our entire galaxy. And nobody on Earth saw it. Located in the plane of our Milky Way galaxy, the light was obscured, but thanks to a suite of great, space-based observatories (Hubble, Spitzer, and Chandra), we've been able to piece together exactly what occurred. Not only that, but observations of a light-echo, or reflected light off of the nearby gas, has allowed us to see the light from this explosion centuries later, and learn exactly how it happened.

Comments

Neat-o.

[mythosaz]

Every time I see a cool space/science story, despite having been an adult for some time now, I still get an awesome sense of "wow" out of it.

Keep on exploring the mysteries of the universe guys.

But we DID saw it...

[antiperimetaparalogo]

"The Milky Way's Most Recent Supernova That Nobody Saw"

But we DID saw it! The same way we see all things...? Some delay (and reflections/"light-echo") exist even for what i see right now in the monitor... am i blind?

11,000 years ago, not 300

[doug]

TFA says it was 11,000 light years away, so it took 11,000 years for the light to get to Earth. We should have seen it 300 years ago, but the explosion was a long time before that. So the summary's opening line of "A little over 300 years ago, a supernova ... exploded" is incorrect.

Re:11,000 years ago, not 300

[iMadeGhostzilla]

No that is the whole point of the Relativity Theory. There is no absolute time or "God time", there are only points in timespace. 300 years ago here on Earth if you could see the photons of the explosion, you were witnessing the explosion exactly as was happening. "Now" spreads at the speed of light so when you see something, it's happening, as far as you are concerned, right now.

Summary.... Incorrect

[aepervius]

Cassiopeia is 11.000 LY away. The star exploded not 300 years ago, but the explosion light reached us 300 years ago. Heck even the article says it wrongly "A supernova dating back to the 17th centuryâSâ"âSthe most recent one in our galaxyâSâ"âSwith a massive black hole left behind. 11,000 light years distant". It might be a bit pedantic, but instead of stating the star exploded 300 years ago, one should say the light of the explosion reached us 300 years ago.