SN Requiem - A supernova we can observe over and over again

[Shpaget]

Thanks to some gravitational lensing magic, the light from a supernova that blew up 10 bly ago has taken multiple paths and reached us multiple times over the span of several years, but not only that! Some very smart people at Niels Bohr Institute calculated that around 2037 we will be able to observe it going kablooey yet again.

https://phys.org/news/2021-09-astronomers-supernova-timesand-fourth-sighting.html

I find it amazing that they were (presumably) able to figure out the structure of matter so far away to be able to calculate the path of light.

I propose we get busy and build a whole bunch of dedicated space telescopes, bigger than anything ever built and launch them quickly into space to observe the big boom from the start. Just how often we get to predict a star is going to go supernova with such accuracy?

[HvP]

I was aware that observations of gravitational lensing and light echoes had been used to map the distribution of matter surrounding interesting phenomena. But it had never occurred to me that they could be used to see a predicted "replay" of a supernova.

This is exciting!

[magnemoe]

34 minutes ago, HvP said:

I was aware that observations of gravitational lensing and light echoes had been used to map the distribution of matter surrounding interesting phenomena. But it had never occurred to me that they could be used to see a predicted "replay" of a supernova.

This is exciting!

Yes, kind of remind me of an science fiction story starting with an astronomer traveling to an far away settled planet in the teleport chain with an fold out inflatable telescope, think an scaled down web space telecope with an inflatable barrel on an trailer. Two stars had suddenly disappeared 20 years ago and he wanted to find out more. 

[kerbiloid]

Spoiler

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BsxAjonyM4Y

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