A Smudge Logged in 1955 May Be a Cosmic Jet's Crash Site

Inside our own galaxy, a star paired with what may be a black hole is firing a jet of matter pointed nearly our way at no less than two-thirds the speed of light. Its twin, aimed the opposite way, appears to be plowing into a giant cloud of cold gas.

A team led by Josep Martí argues in Astronomy & Astrophysics that the system, IRAS 18293−0941, is a strong candidate for a microblazar. Think of it as a homegrown, pint-size cousin of the blazars in distant galaxies, whose jets point our way. The team's model places a black hole about 10 times heavier than our sun at the center, feeding on a hefty partner star that circles it every 11.4 days.

Radio surveys taken years apart show one bright core and a single lobe. The backward jet is too dim to spot, which fits a forward jet brightened by racing toward us.

Farther out, radio, infrared and glowing-hydrogen images reveal a compact hotspot where the receding jet seems to slam into the cloud. Astronomers cataloged a small nebula at that exact spot in 1955 and never assigned it a category.

The crash zone also overlaps a source of extremely energetic gamma rays seen by the LHAASO observatory. The researchers suggest protons flung from the jet could be striking the cloud's gas to make that light, though rival suspects sit nearby.

One expected trait is missing. Systems like this should flicker fast, and this one holds steady. The team suspects a thick dust shroud is smoothing the flicker away.

The model gives this jet about 50,000 years to drill its tunnel through space. It seems to have hit the far wall right where someone in 1955 left a sticky note.

Read the full story at Astronomy & Astrophysics, August 30, 2026

Hot Take: Every classroom has a box of unlabeled rock samples nobody sorts. Astronomers left one in theirs for 71 years, and it may have been marking a jet's bullseye. Somebody go open the other boxes.