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What Would You See As You Plummet Into a Black Hole? (Video)

Posted by ralph on February 10, 2010

Hazel Muir writes on New Scientist:

A new interactive program reveals the spectacular light show you’d see if you dared to wander close to a black hole. It demonstrates how the extreme gravity of a black hole could appear to shred background constellations of stars, spinning them around as though in a giant black washing machine.

The program’s creators say it could be an excellent tool to familiarise people with the weird ways that black holes warp light. “It’s useful for people to play around with the parameters to study how, for instance, a black hole would distort the constellation Orion,” says Thomas Müller of the University of Stuttgart in Germany.

Read More: New Scientist

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  • Chris

    Wow that is amazing and scary at same time!

  • 5by5

    Two things I find scary?

    1.) There's a supermassive one of these puppies at the center of our galaxy.

    2.) If Stephen Hawking is correct, the fate of our universe is to be one of the places where literally all data – everything that ever happened in this 'verse – will be gobbled up by said black holes. By his calculations some universes will persist. This just doesn't happen to be one of them. Also, his contention is that our universe is basically geared towards making black holes, not making life. We're the anomaly.

    Unless of course, we can find a way to take the red pill and get the hell out of here and into another one of the multiverses…

  • phil thje drijll

    what a load

  • bryan cooper

    Are black holes only trying to tell us something? They may only appear as a ‘hole’ from a certain vantage in space, ie: looking at the hole from Space to the left of the picture, would the hole still retain a circular shape? Are we looking down the end of a more ‘cyclone’ shape? (affecting light behind it). I have not researched black holes. The narrator says they can be orbited. Great simulation.

  • bryan cooper

    Are black holes only trying to tell us something? They may only appear as a 'hole' from a certain vantage in space, ie: looking at the hole from Space to the left of the picture, would the hole still retain a circular shape? Are we looking down the end of a more 'cyclone' shape? (affecting light behind it). I have not researched black holes. The narrator says they can be orbited. Great simulation.