Given The Boot...

This Hubble Space Telescope image shows a quasar (bright object at center) and its host galaxy, 3C186 (the diffuse object behind it). Scientists think 3C186’s central black hole was ejected from the galaxy’s core by gravitational waves.
Credit: NASA, ESA, and M. Chiaberge (STScI/ESA)

Topics: Black Holes, Cosmology, General Relativity, Gravitational Waves

A supermassive black hole heftier than 1 billion suns has been ejected from the core of its galaxy by gravitational waves, a new study suggests.

The monster black hole has already zoomed 35,000 light-years away from its galaxy's center, farther than Earth and its sun are from the core of our own Milky Way. And the behemoth is currently traveling outward at 4.7 million mph (7.6 million km/h) — fast enough for the black hole to escape its galaxy completely in 20 million years, researchers said.

“We estimate that it took the equivalent energy of 100 million supernovae exploding simultaneously to jettison the black hole,” study co-author Stefano Bianchi, from Roma Tre University in Italy, said in a statement.

Space.com: Gravitational Waves Boot Gigantic Black Hole from Galaxy's Core
Mike Wall