‘We’re seeing the unseeable’: Scientists reveal first true image of a black hole
- Astronomers hold six press conferences simultaneously in Belgium, Chile, Shanghai, Japan, Taipei, and the US to unveil results from the Event Horizon Telescope
- Black holes are so powerful that nothing nearby – not even light – can escape their gravitational pull
An international scientific team has unveiled a landmark achievement in astrophysics: the first true image of a black hole.
The image reveals the black hole at the centre of Messier 87 (M87), a massive galaxy in the nearby Virgo galaxy cluster. This black hole resides about 54 million light years from Earth.
Black holes are phenomenally dense celestial entities with gravitational fields so powerful no matter or light can escape, making them extraordinarily difficult to observe despite their great mass.
News conferences took place in Washington, Brussels, Santiago, Shanghai, Taipei and Tokyo to disclose the “groundbreaking result” from the Event Horizon Telescope (EHT) project, begun in 2012 to directly observe the immediate environment of a black hole using a global network of telescopes. The 10 radio telescopes on four continents collectively operate like a single instrument nearly the size of Earth.
“This is a huge day in astrophysics,” said US National Science Foundation Director France Córdova in Washington. “We’re seeing the unseeable.”
