is then gone forever. black holes are created when dying stars collapse in on themselves or when two stars collide and their masses merge. the gravitational forces become so massive that the matter is squeezed into a single point called the singularity. black holes start small but as they suck up more and more material in their path they can begin to grow and eventually become super massive black holes like the one of the center of our galaxy the milky way. with the gravitational pull stronger than four million stars similar to our sun. until now astronomers have been unable to see the milky way central supermassive black hole directly they inferred its existence from the stars orbiting around the black hole and from hot matter surrounding it this first image has only been possible through the event horizon telescope a global network of radio telescopes gathering data from all around the world. a