3 Monster Black Holes Are About to Collide

From Live Science.com (Sept. 27):

They're at the core of a triple galaxy merger 1 billion light-years from Earth.

A rare trio of supermassive black holes has been caught in the act of coming together.

Three of the light-gobbling monsters nuzzle shoulder to shoulder in SDSS J084905.51+111447.2, a system of three merging galaxies about 1 billion light-years from Earth, a new study reports.

"We were only looking for pairs of black holes at the time, and yet, through our selection technique, we stumbled upon this amazing system," lead author Ryan Pfeifle, of George Mason University in Virginia, said in a statement. "This is the strongest evidence yet found for such a triple system of actively feeding supermassive black holes." [read more]

More articles about black holes:

• Black Holes As We Know Them May Not Exist
• Could life survive on an Earth-like planet orbiting a black hole?
• Astronomers may have discovered a new class of tiny black holes
• Black Holes Grow Hair, Then Go Bald Again
• Stellar Black Hole Is So Massive It Shouldn't Exist