A massive gamma-ray burst (GRB) that was passing through our solar system was detected early on October 9 by a number of space-based detectors, which prompted astronomers to focus their telescopes there in order to gather crucial information about the event and its afterglow.

The gamma-ray burst, known as GRB 221009A, is the most potent one yet seen, according to scientists, and it may well be the 'birth scream' of a brand-new black hole. The Astronomer's Telegram swiftly reported the incident, and observations are still being made.

Because this burst stands out among the thousands of bursts that gamma-ray telescopes have been able to detect since the 1990s, Jillian Rastinejad, a doctoral student at Northwestern University, and her research team have been referring to it as the 'BOAT,' or Brightest Of All Time. Two separate teams, each lead by Rastinejad, used the Gemini South telescope in Chile to examine the event's afterglow.

The Fermi Large Area Telescope (LAT) Collaboration member Roberta Pillera, a PhD student at the Polytechnic University of Bari in Italy, remarked, 'This burst is much closer than ordinary GRBs, which is exciting since it allows us to identify numerous characteristics that otherwise would be too faint to observe.'

Extremely energetic explosions known as gamma-ray bursts occur in faraway galaxies and can last anywhere from a few minutes to several hours. Due to the US launching the Vela satellites, the first gamma-ray bursts were seen in the late 1960s. In the wake of the 1963 Nuclear Test Ban Treaty with the Soviet Union, they were designed to identify the distinctive gamma-ray signals of nuclear weapons testing. The US was concerned that the Soviet Union was breaking the deal by conducting covert nuclear testing. Two of the satellites detected a flare of gamma radiation in July 1967 that was obviously not the result of a nuclear weapons test.

Later Vela satellites with better instruments captured a number of further gamma-ray bursts, but those data were stored away. For the purpose of estimating the sky position of 16 such bursts, a group at Los Alamos National Laboratory examined the times that each burst was picked up by various satellites. They also came to the conclusion that the bursts were not coming from Earth or our Solar System and reported their findings in a 1973 study in the Astrophysical Journal.

Gamma-ray bursts can be classified into two groups. The majority (70%) are extended bursts that last more than two seconds and frequently have a strong afterglow. These frequently relate to galaxies that have a high rate of star production. Long bursts are thought to be related to the demise of big stars collapsing to create neutron stars or black holes, according to astronomers. In order to emit X-rays and gamma rays, the baby black hole would release jets of extremely energetic particles travelling at close to the speed of light. These jets would be strong enough to pierce through the progenitor star's remnants.

About 30% of gamma-ray bursts are classified as short bursts and typically originate from areas with relatively little star formation. These gamma-ray bursts, which are known as 'kilonovae,' are thought by astronomers to be the outcome of mergers between neutron stars or between neutron stars and black holes.

Detectors on NASA's Fermi Gamma-ray Space Telescope, the Neil Gehrels Swift Observatory, and the Wind satellite, among others, were activated by GRB 221009A just as gamma-ray astronomers met in Johannesburg, South Africa, for an annual symposium. The strong signal, which travelled to Earth over 1.9 billion years, originated in the constellation Sagitta. Additionally, it lasted exceptionally long—the LAT observed the burst for 10 hours.