Backyard Black Holes!

Last night, the astronomy session was one of the best that I've had in many months.  The new moon had already set, the sky was without clouds, transparency was good, as was the seeing.

I had to use a vacation day from work so I could stay out all night, but it was worth it!

By now, everyone has probably seen the iconic image of M87's supermassive black hole, first published in April of 2019.

It was created after years of data gathering and processing by the scientists of the  Event Horizon Telescope collaboration.

First image of a black hole, using Event Horizon Telescope 

observations of the center of galaxy M87. Credit: Event Horizon 

Telescope Collaboration.

Astronomy magazine has a good article here.

But what does this have to do with me as an amature astronomer?