If youre worried about high-wind hurricanes hitting your neighborhood this year, just be thankful that you dont live near a black hole! Scientists using the Chandra X-ray space observatory recently reported winds of up to 1 million m.p.h. (1.6 million kilometers per hour) zooming near a distant black hole. The discovery marks the first time such powerful gas flows have been measured near one of these mighty cosmic objects.

Matter falls into black holes because these faraway objects are extremely dense. One result of this free-fall is that the matter actually gives off energy in the form of radiation as it gets sucked in.

The bright spot in the center of this image is the galaxy NGC 3783. Winds near this galaxy, which was observed by the Chandra X-ray observatory, were clocked at 1 million m.p.h. (1.6 million kilometers per hour).

The black hole in question was studied by astronomers analyzing data obtained by the High-Energy Transmission Grating and CCD X-ray camera instruments on board Chandra. This particular black hole resides at the center of a distant galaxy, called NGC 3783.

Black holes are generally believed to reside at the center of most if not all galaxies. They are regions of space where the gravitational force is so strong, not even light can escape its grasp. Thus, although no black holes has ever been "seen" with the naked eye, their presence has been detected numerous times by instruments sensitive to matter flowing into and being generated by the black hole.

The Chandra X-ray observatory, which has been in orbit around Earth since July 1999, has allowed astronomers to indirectly observe black holes with amazing precision. "This is the most detailed X-ray spectrum ever taken of a galaxy with an active black hole," said Penn State astronomer Shai Kasp of the data used in this most recent discovery.