Mystery Explosion in space

C.E. Dorsett

The universe has thrown us a curveball:

Astronomers have detected a new type of cosmic outburst that they can't yet explain. The event was very close to our galaxy, they said.

The eruption might portend an even brighter event to come, a supernova (Space.com).

Personally, I like it when we discover new things.  It keeps us from thinking to highly of our own intellect.  This object is very interesting.

The blast seemed a lot like a gamma-ray burst, the most distant and powerful type of explosion known to astronomers.

But when scientists first detected it with NASA's Swift satellite on February 18, the explosion was about 25 times closer and lasted 100 times longer than a typical gamma-ray burst (Reuters).

Here is the NASA page of the Explosion. Cool pics.