A gamma ray burst is an extremely energetic explosion and this one came from the constellation Sagitta. The burst’s signal – called GRB 221009A – was picked up by several ESA observatories. Some noticed a sudden increase in the detection of high-energy emissions, others turned to the source soon after. The event took place about 1.9 billion years ago and likely indicates the birth of a black hole. The EPHIN Energetic Particle Detector on the SOHO spacecraft and the Starless Object Counter on the Sky Mapper instrument on the Gaia spacecraft received a signal at the same time around 13:20 UTC (15:20 CEST) on October 9, 2022. Gaia engineers were initially confused. with this anomalous signal, but soon discovered that they had measured GRB 221009A. Graphs of the event from Gaia and SOHO are shown at the bottom of the image. The vertical shows the number of high-energy particles/non-stellar objects over time. A clear peak indicates the sudden detection of a high number. The top left image was taken by the IBIS/ISGRI instrument on the Integral spacecraft. It shows the location of bursts in the sky as a source of powerful gamma rays. This long exposure image was taken a day after the eruption and shows the still active site. Several other instruments on Integral also observed the initial burst, for example the SPI/ACS instrument measured gamma rays from the burst itself. After the discovery, XMM-Newton headed for the location in the sky. The result is a wonderful image (top right) of the explosion echo that shows X-rays being scattered by the interstellar dust in our galaxy in magnificent rings. Click here to access the separate XMM-Newton image. The ESA-led Solar Orbiter and BepiColombo missions also observed the explosion. Solar Orbiter detected X-rays of the explosion with its STIX instrument. The EPD instrument detected energetic particles created after the high-energy emission interacted with the spacecraft itself. BepiColombo measured the gamma rays. the data is analyzed. The explosion provided an unexpected opportunity where different ESA missions came together to study the same astronomical event. ESA designs and manages a world-class science program together with its Member States, with a long-term vision of leadership in many areas of space science. ESA Science is a world leader specifically in the physics of the hot and energetic Universe, such as black holes and their environment. It is not the first time that several of ESA’s missions have observed the same event independently, but it is unusual for an event in the distant Universe to be detected across the fleet, including missions designed to explore the Solar System rather than the deep Universe.
