The Region : Star Explosion Confirmed

Astronomers said that a newly discovered object in a nearby galaxy definitely is a gigantic exploding star, the brightest supernova observed since one seen in 1604 by Johannes Kepler. Brian Marsden, director of the Smithsonian Institution’s Central Bureau for Astronomical Telegrams, a reporting agency for astronomy discoveries, said in Los Angeles that the object now designated 1987A was discovered by University of Toronto astronomer Ian Shelton, who spotted it through a telescope in Chile. Scientists said at the time that there was some possibility it was simply a star of varying brightness in our own Milky Way galaxy, but observations of light emitted by the object showed that material is being blown away from it by a gargantuan supernova blast.