Thread by @NASAUniverse

The Burst Alert Telescope, or BAT, on our Swift satellite just surpassed 1 million triggers! 🎉 The BAT constantly watches for gamma-ray bursts — powerful but fleeting explosions signaling a black hole’s birth. 💥 Get up to speed on gamma-ray bursts here: tmblr.co/Zz_Uqj2aNmOwb

☑️ The BAT’s onboard algorithms review each trigger to see if it’s a cosmic source or a statistical fluctuation. In sifting through those many triggers, Swift’s BAT has detected about 1,400 bona fide bursts along with a number of other notable discoveries.
👀 Let’s look at some.

The initial flash in some gamma-ray bursts lasts less than two seconds, making it hard to lock on to them for follow-up observations. ⏱️ Swift was designed to do just that and pinpointed its first “short” gamma-ray burst afterglow in May 2005. Learn more: go.nasa.gov/371jmip

Because gamma-ray bursts are so bright, they are among the most distant objects we can detect. 📏 The farthest known, spotted by Swift’s BAT, exploded when the universe was only 640 million years old. For more: go.nasa.gov/33SzyQY

Swift’s BAT also discovered a new class of gamma-ray bursts whose high-energy surges last hours, much longer than normal bursts lasting less than a minute! ⏳ They could come from the collapse of giant stars that have 20 times more mass than the Sun. More: go.nasa.gov/3iWlZnO

Not all of Swift BAT’s triggers are gamma-ray bursts, but they still signal some spectacular events. In 2011, it found the signal of black hole as it shredded and consumed a star! 🍴⭐ Learn more about this remarkable event: go.nasa.gov/33VcZve

Swift’s BAT detected an erupting black hole that created these nested rings of X-ray light. 🎯 The rings result from X-rays reflecting off of dust layers around the black hole. Read more: go.nasa.gov/3jYfdPT