This is a nice story that should make you pause for a minute and see how insignificant we can be in the face of such gargantuan power.
This is from wiki:
It has been hypothesized that a gamma-ray burst in the Milky Way could cause a mass extinction on Earth.[2]
Nasa satellite 'blinded by biggest ever star explosion seen in space'
A Nasa satellite was temporarily blinded after the brightest explosion of a star ever witnessed in space, officials admitted.
"It was like trying to use a rain gauge and a bucket to measure the flow rate of a tsunami. This burst is one for the record books."
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/science/...iggest-ever-star-explosion-seen-in-space.html
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gamma-ray_burst
The sources of most GRBs are billions of light years away from Earth, implying that the explosions are both extremely energetic (a typical burst releases as much energy in a few seconds as the Sun will in its entire 10 billion year lifetime) and extremely rare (a few per galaxy per million years[1]). All observed GRBs have originated from outside the Milky Way galaxy, although a related class of phenomena, soft gamma repeater flares, are associated with magnetars within the Milky Way. It has been hypothesized that a gamma-ray burst in the Milky Way could cause a mass extinction on Earth.[2]
This is from wiki:
It has been hypothesized that a gamma-ray burst in the Milky Way could cause a mass extinction on Earth.[2]
Nasa satellite 'blinded by biggest ever star explosion seen in space'
A Nasa satellite was temporarily blinded after the brightest explosion of a star ever witnessed in space, officials admitted.
"It was like trying to use a rain gauge and a bucket to measure the flow rate of a tsunami. This burst is one for the record books."
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/science/...iggest-ever-star-explosion-seen-in-space.html
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gamma-ray_burst
The sources of most GRBs are billions of light years away from Earth, implying that the explosions are both extremely energetic (a typical burst releases as much energy in a few seconds as the Sun will in its entire 10 billion year lifetime) and extremely rare (a few per galaxy per million years[1]). All observed GRBs have originated from outside the Milky Way galaxy, although a related class of phenomena, soft gamma repeater flares, are associated with magnetars within the Milky Way. It has been hypothesized that a gamma-ray burst in the Milky Way could cause a mass extinction on Earth.[2]