The tide is high: Star torn apart by black hole causes light show beyond compare

An artist’s impression of a tidal disruption event where a star is being torn apart by a supermassive black hole.

An “extraordinary flash” seen in the sky earlier this year was caused by a distant star being “squeezed like a toothpaste tube” by a supermassive black hole, astronomers have said.

In what experts describe as one of the most violent events in the universe, the unlucky star met its fate after wandering too close to this black hole, sparking a light show bright enough – with more light than a thousand trillion suns – to be detected by instruments on Earth.