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Creepy interstellar 'face' spotted by Hubble space telescope

Two piercing eyes are staring at us from 700 million light years away.
Credit: NASA, ESA, and J. Dalcanton, B.F. Williams, and M. Durbin (University of Washington)
An image from the Hubble Space Telescope of Arp-Madore 2026-424, a collision of two galaxies, June 19, 2019.

Just in time for Halloween, NASA has released a new image from the Hubble Space Telescope of two colliding galaxies that brings a perfect creepy factor for the holiday. One could say it resembles the hockey-masked Jason Voorhees from "Friday The 13th."

The image, taken June 19, appears to show two glowing eyes staring toward Earth.

NASA says each "eye" is the core of a different galaxy that slammed into each other. Surrounding them is the outline of a face made up of young, blue stars. Other new stars appear to show a nose and mouth.

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The entire system is named Arp-Madore 2026-424 (AM 2026-424).

Credit: NASA, ESA, and J. Dalcanton, B.F. Williams, and M. Durbin (University of Washington)
An image from the Hubble Space Telescope of Arp-Madore 2026-424, a collision of two galaxies, June 19, 2019.

NASA says galaxy collisions are common, but most are not "head-on smashups" like this one. The ring that makes up the face is a short-lived phenomenon by the universe's standards -- just 100 million years.

The two galaxies will merge into one, but don't hold your breath. That will take a couple billion years. And visiting it is not an option as it is 704   million light years from Earth.

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