Home VHS: Black Holes space doc

Black holes are some of the strangest objects in the universe.

An area of gravity so strong, not even light can escape.

Black holes were proven in theory for decades, but the first one to be detected...

... was Cygnus X-1, discovered in 1971.

The distance at which a black hole begins to influence matter...

... is the event horizon.

Within the event horizon, things can only move...

... towards the black hole's centre, the singularity.

To an outside observer, even time itself becomes ever slower in a black hole.

A physical object falling into a black hole would "spaghettify"...

... stretching ever longer vertically until becoming compacted to infinity...

... at the singularity.

It has been theorised that black holes emit small amounts of radiation...

... causing evaporation over time.

However, even a black hole the size of the sun...

... would take 10-to-the-power-of-64 years to evaporate...

... so if you're going inside a black hole, remember to bring a good book.