Astronomers have caught a stellar-mass black hole hurling hot material into space at close to the speed of light using four Chandra observations taken in 2018 and 2019. "Day 0" corresponds to the first observation on November 13th, 2018 and the jet launched on July 7th, 2018. A large optical and infrared image of the Milky Way galaxy is shown, with the location of MAXI J1820+070 marked by a cross. The Chandra X-ray view shows a close-up of the system centered on the black hole. The data reveal that two jets pointed in opposite directions, launched just outside the event horizon, are blasting away from the black hole at about 80% of the speed of light.

This series of optical and infrared images zoom us in to the location of MAXI J1820+070. MAXI J1820 is a system with a black hole and companion star about 10,000 light years from Earth.

This illustration shows a black hole pulling material away from a closely orbiting companion star. Some of the hot gas in the disk will cross the "event horizon" (the point of no return) and fall into the black hole, some of it is instead blasted away from the black hole in a pair of short beams of material, or jets. These jets are pointed in opposite directions, launched from outside the event horizon along magnetic field lines.