Astronomers Say They'll Soon Release First Video of a Black Hole

Coming in 2020: the first-ever video of a black hole.

Casting Call

In a new interview with Agence France-Presse, the leader of the team that shared the first image of a black hole last year revealed the squad's next release: a video of the cosmic monster devouring vast clouds of gas.

"It could be that maybe we will make the first crude movie" by 2020, Event Horizon Telescope Collaboration Director Shep Doeleman told the news service. He also opined, modestly, that the project has "delivered more value than any other scientific project that I can think of in history."

Star Power

Last year, Doeleman's team made history when it released a still image of M87*, an unfathomably colossal black hole at the heart of a distant galaxy.

To pull off the unprecedented feat, the Event Horizon Telescope researchers crunched the data from a network of eight telescopes around the world.

Hole Show

According to Doeleman, the team has already collected all the data it needs to make the video, but it's still processing the huge cache of information. AFP warned, though, that the resulting video "might be a little jerky."

"We do see ourselves as explorers, we've taken a journey in our minds," Doeleman told AFP. "And we are instruments at the edge of a black hole. And now we're coming back to report what we found."

READ MORE: Black hole movies coming soon, says leading astronomer [AFP]

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