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What About a Tidal Disruption in the Milky Way?
Lurking in the center of our own Milky Way galaxy is a supermassive black hole
with a mass that is about 3 million times that of the Sun. What are the
chances of a tidal disruption happening there? Astronomers estimate that
these events happen only about once every 10,000 years, so the chances are
low. Our Sun is certainly not in danger, because it is about 26,000 light
years from the Milky Way's center, avoiding the possibility of
gravitational interactions that might throw it towards the central black
hole.
But, the resulting event would still be spectacular, as viewed from the
safe distance of our Solar System. If our Galactic Center's black hole were
to tear a star apart, the resulting X-ray source would easily outshine
every other X-ray source in the sky besides the Sun, frying the instruments
aboard Chandra and XMM! The center of the Milky Way would become a hundred billion times brighter in X-rays than it is now.
Return to RX J1242-11 (18 Feb 04)
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