Though an estimated 100 million black holes roam our Milky Way galaxy, these objects are
invisible and so very difficult to detect.
Astronomers now believe they may have precisely measured the mass of an isolated black hole
for the first time.
After six years of observations, NASA’s Hubble Space Telescope found evidence for
a lone black hole about 5,000 light-years away wandering through interstellar space.
Black holes roaming our galaxy are born from rare, monstrous stars, less than one-thousandth
of the galaxy’s stellar population, that are many times more massive than our Sun.
These stars die in supernova explosions – their cores crushed by the star’s own gravity
into a black hole.
Because the detonation is asymmetrical, the black hole may get a kick, sending it careening
through our galaxy.
Hubble detected the magnified and deflected light from a star lined up exactly behind
the potential black hole, as its intense gravity warps space itself.
The measurements indicate the black hole weighs seven solar masses, and is traveling through
space at 100,000 miles per hour!
But don’t worry, there’s a lot of space between Earth and this roaming black hole!