A star 20 times the size of the sun died in a supernova — and telescopes around the world joined forces to watch it

['Elizabeth Howell', 'Brandon Specktor', 'Laura Mondragón', 'Live Science Contributor', 'Layer Van-Ds .Vds-Author Font-Size Var --Text-Base', 'Font-Size Var --Vds-Author-Font-Size', 'Var --Text-Base', 'Line-Height Var --Text-Base--Line-Height', 'Line-Height Var --Vds-Author-Line-Height', 'Var --Text-Base--Line-Height'] Latest from Live Science 2026-08-05 20:47:46

A fleet of telescopes around the world just captured the first shocking moments of a supernova explosion in the most detailed-ever observations of their kind. Ground-based telescopes jumped in within the hour and quickly identified the flash as a supernova, a powerful explosion of a massive dying star. With this fleet of telescopes, astronomers charted how the light of the supernova, located 500 million light-years away, changed over time. "One possibility is that the jet was 'choked,' either by the surface of the star or by circumstellar material surrounding the star." Telescopes of the world uniteThe Vera C. Rubin Observatory happened to be monitoring the area (left) when the supernova erupted.