Tidal Disruption Events are spectacular to witness considering it is a supermassive black hole pulling in a star that got too close in its orbit. The result of such a phenomenon usually falls on the star losing half its mass to the black hole and the other half to be ejected at an incredible speed. Recently, Jon Miller of the University of Michigan, and his colleagues reported the nearest TDE so far. Galaxy PGC 043234 has a black hole, ASASSN-14li, at its center that recently shred a star to bits.

The event had a redshift of about 0.02 meaning the light had only traveled 290 millions years to reach the earth. This distance is close enough for astronomers to see the X-rays emitted by the star's gas falling into the black hole.

 Some of the gas was whipped outward and ejected, proven by the X-ray spectra that showed blueshifts in the tail of the gas. The blueshifts are an indicator that the gas is moving towards the earth and away from the black hole.

Below are the spectra that show the tail is being whipped towards us while the left shows a brief illustration of what it might look like.


More information can be found at skyandtelescope.com and the journal uploaded to nature.com by Miller and his colleagues.