Peculiar galaxy transforms into monstrous black hole that now faces Earth

A strange and mysterious galaxy has been reclassified as a ginormous black hole that is now directly facing Earth and the solar system, scientists revealed on Tuesday. According to the Royal Astronomical Society, PBC J2333.9-2343 was initially categorised as a radio galaxy but upon deeper observation, it was found that its black hole had diverted from it original direction, rotating 90 degrees. It now points directly towards our home planet.

“We started to study this galaxy as it showed peculiar properties. Our hypothesis was that the relativistic jet of its supermassive black hole had changed its direction, and to confirm that idea we had to carry out a lot of observations,” said Dr. Lorena Hernandez-Garcia.

“The fact that we see the nucleus is not feeding the lobes anymore means that they are very old. They are the relics of past activity, whereas the structures located closer to the nucleus represent younger and active jets," she added. Initially, researchers deduced that the galaxy lies some 657 million light-years away. However, they have now said that it stretches nearly 4 million light-years across and is 40 times the size of the Milky Way. 

Is the black hole life-threatening to Earth? 

The emergence of the black hole poses a number of questions, many of which remain unanswered for now. At present, it is unclear what prompted the galaxy to change its direction, and how this change can impact the solar system. Some speculate that  PBC J2333.9-2343 had a collision with another galaxy that led to its redirection.

But the peculiar space phenomena isn't the only thing threatening the Earth. Last year, three near-Earth asteroids (NEA) were spotted in the inner solar system which can be potentially hazardous to our planet. “Our twilight survey is scouring the area within the orbits of Earth and Venus for asteroids. So far we have found two large near-Earth asteroids that are about 1 kilometer across, a size that we call planet killers," said researcher and astronomer Scott Sheppard, according to CNN. “It would be a mass extinction event like hasn’t been seen on Earth in millions of years. This is what we call a planet killer. If this one hits the Earth, it would cause planetwide destruction. It would be very bad for life as we know it," he added.