Our galaxy is due for a catastrophic collision, study says

[micropage7]

The Large Magellanic Cloud will catastrophically collide with the Milky Way in 2 billion years, according to a study published this month in the Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society. The impact, which they believe is long overdue, has a chance of sending our solar system "hurtling through space."

Our galaxy is orbited by smaller satellite galaxies, the kind of dance that can go on undisturbed for billions of years. Other times, things take a violent turn, and satellite galaxies can migrate toward the Milky Way until they collide and are gobbled up.

The Large Magellanic Cloud is fairly new to orbiting the Milky Way, entering our corner of the universe 1.5 billion years ago. It's now the brightest satellite galaxy we have, 163,000 light-years from the Milky Way. Previously, astronomers thought it would hang out in a quiet, long orbit or speed away from the gravity of the Milky Way and move on.
But new measurements suggest that this little satellite galaxy was hiding a big secret, and it has a much larger mass than expected. This means the Large Magellanic Cloud is losing energy, which will trigger it to collide with the Milky Way.

"The destruction of the Large Magellanic Cloud, as it is devoured by the Milky Way, will wreak havoc with our galaxy, waking up the black hole that lives at its center and turning our galaxy into an 'active galactic nucleus' or quasar," Marius Cautun, study author and postdoctoral fellow at Durham University's Institute for Computational Cosmology, said in a statement.

What does that mean, exactly?

"This phenomenon will generate powerful jets of high energy radiation emanating from just outside the black hole," Cautun said. "While this will not affect our Solar System, there is a small chance that we might not escape unscathed from the collision between the two galaxies which could knock us out of the Milky Way and into interstellar space."
Although 2 billion years sounds like an incredible length of time for us, that's much less than the age of the universe: 13.8 billion years. The Milky Way galaxy itself is about 13.5 billion years old, so hasn't it survived galactic collisions before?

"We think that up to now our galaxy has had only a few mergers with very low mass galaxies," Alis Deason, study co-author and royal society university research fellow at the Durham University's Institute for Computational Cosmology, said in a statement. "This represents very slim pickings when compared to nearby galaxies of the same size as the Milky Way. For example, our nearest neighbour, the Andromeda galaxy, devoured galaxies weighing nearly 30 times more than those consumed by the Milky Way. Therefore, the collision with the Large Magellanic Cloud is long overdue and it is needed to make our galaxy typical."

If it doesn't send our solar system hurtling through space, the galactic show will be something to see from Earth's perspective. And the researchers suggested that violent events have long shaped the universe.
"Barring any disasters, like a major disturbance to the Solar System, our descendants, if any, are in for a treat: a spectacular display of cosmic fireworks as the newly awakened supermassive black hole at the centre of our galaxy reacts by emitting jets of extremely bright energetic radiation," Carlos Frenk, study co-author and director for the Durham University's Institute for Computational Cosmology, said in a statement.

https://edition.cnn.com/2019/01/12/world/galactic-collision-milky-way/index.html

 

[the54thvoid]

Andromeda is already booked in for a collision with the Milky Way but I think it's like 4 billion years away.

https://phys.org/news/2016-10-galaxies-collide.html

 

[btarunr]

This means our Sun will outlive its parent galaxy.

 

[eidairaman1]

Well none of us will be in this realm, tpu will probably be a forgotten relic by then.

 

[rtwjunkie]

This means our Sun will outlive its parent galaxy.

Probably not by much. It is currently at its halfway point of life. Likely by that time it will have expanded to a red giant, or be close to that phase, with very low mass, and will relatively soon (in cosmic timeline) swallow up the Earth. That makes all of this merely academic.

 

[Zyll Goliat]

I just hope Star Citizen will enter into beta until then.........

 

[eidairaman1]

Probably not by much. It is currently at its halfway point of life. Likely by that time it will have expanded to a red giant, or be close to that phase, with very low mass, and will relatively soon (in cosmic timeline) swallow up the Earth. That makes all of this merely academic.

Speculative/theory

 

[rtwjunkie]

Speculative/theory

LOL, it’s widely accepted amongst astrophysicists, and no more speculation than this article being discussed.

 

[Vayra86]

Shit, only two billion years left.

Musk, will you hurry up already

I just hope Star Citizen will enter into beta until then.........

 

[FreedomEclipse]

I welcome it. The world has long been slave to rich, greed, corruption and those who control the world from the shadows.

The richer protect the rich, The richer get even richer while the less well off suffer and continue to suffer as public funds are cut, Jobs are cut while the cost of living continuously rises beyond the the wages of many who have to struggle harder to afford to have rent paid. own their own home or the little things such as car ownership and raising a family.

If this collision takes the world back to square one while im alive or not, I welcome it. Let us abolish the walls that humanity have put up around themselves, Let us destroy this facet, this 'us vs them' mentality that many races and nations have built up over the years. Let us wipe the slate clean of all greed and corruption and start again where everyone can be seen as equal regardless of race, creed or religion.

 

[Vayra86]

I welcome it. The world has long been slave to rich, greed, corruption and those who control the world from the shadows.

The richer protect the rich, The richer get even richer while the less well off suffer and continue to suffer as public funds are cut, Jobs are cut while the cost of living continuously rises beyond the the wages of many who have to struggle harder to afford to have rent paid. own their own home or the little things such as car ownership and raising a family.

If this collision takes the world back to square one while im alive or not, I welcome it. Let us abolish the walls that humanity have put up around themselves, Let us destroy this facet, this 'us vs them' mentality that many races and nations have built up over the years. Let us wipe the slate clean of all greed and corruption and start again where everyone can be seen as equal regardless of race, creed or religion.

You're in a good mood today I see I think the only thing that will really do is postpone the inevitable repeat of everything we've done before.

Us humans like to work in cycles, is my belief. We fail hard the first time, and take the lessons learned to fail a bit less hard the next. And we are persistent mfgrs that keep failing until we get it right.

 

[cucker tarlson]

I read the title and wondered if I should cancel my order for a ssd that I just placed.

 

[FreedomEclipse]

I read the title and wondered if I should cancel my order for a ssd that I just placed.

that would be a Super Sound Decision

You're in a good mood today I see I think the only thing that will really do is postpone the inevitable repeat of everything we've done before.

Us humans like to work in cycles, is my belief. We fail hard the first time, and take the lessons learned to fail a bit less hard the next. And we are persistent mfgrs that keep failing until we get it right.

Plus on the brighter side, we fix the issue with overpopulation.

 

[kastriot]

Enjoy your lives and don't bother with "out of range" things.

 

[Vayra86]

Plus on the brighter side, we fix the issue with overpopulation.

But we need drones to mine the asteroids soon!

 

[eidairaman1]

But we need drones to mine the asteroids soon!

ID-0

 

[Norton]

Thread pending movement to The Lounge in....3....2....

This was intended as a S&T thread afaik but really not seeing much of that in the posts

 

[27MaD]

Our galaxy is duo for a catastrophic collision since 2012 i guess , this shit just won't stop year after year , idk , what's exciting about the end of the world ?

Enjoy your lives and don't bother with "out of range" things.

You sir , are a true legend.

If you guys keep digging about the end of the galaxy and our planet it will feel like we are dying unbelievably soon but if you ignore it , life is too long.

 

[MrGenius]

Catastrophic for the LMC. NOT the Milky Way. Which will eat the LMC like a midnight snack(with possibly a small burp afterwards). And will hardly "wreak havoc" on our galaxy(anywhere not in the direct line of fire of any relativistic jets produced by the supermassive black hole that is). It will be a relatively minor event in the grander scheme of things.

When we collide with Andromeda...now that's a different story. But still not a catastrophe by any means. Just an evolution into a new galaxy(Milkomeda, or Milkdromeda if you prefer). Galactic collisions are generally not considered to be destructive events. But, rather, constructive. Much more, by huge orders of magnitude, is typically created than destroyed. Like the sparking of thousands, to billions, of new stars into life. While the likelihood of any particular star(or planet, or what have you) being destroyed(or thrown out of the galaxy) in the process is extremely small.

Side note: We may already be colliding with the outskirts of Andromeda as we speak.