A white dwarf star located approximately 160,000 light years away has been observed to have exploded not once, but twice. Astronomers have discovered the first proof of a supernova being linked to dual explosions.

The White Dwarf Star represents a dead stellar body, much like our Sun, which has exhausted its nuclear fuel, leaving an Earth-sized core. When a white dwarf siphons material from a companion star, it can accumulate enough mass to trigger an explosion as a Type IA supernova.

The process by which a white dwarf becomes a supernova remains largely unclear. Some astronomers have theorized that two separate explosions might occur, but until now, there has been no concrete evidence supporting this.

Priyam Das, from the University of New South Wales in Canberra, along with colleagues, examined spectra acquired by a large telescope at the European Southern Observatory in Chile. Their studies of the supernova remnant in the Large Magellanic Cloud reveal two distinct concentric shells resulting from the explosions.

Das theorizes that the white dwarf must have amassed helium on its surface, potentially from a nearby helium-rich white dwarf or a giant helium-rich star, leading to its eventual explosion.

“We witness the initial helium explosion occurring very quickly, within a mere few dozen seconds; it all happens in an instant,” states Das.

The material ejected during the first explosion was recorded to be traveling at 25,000 kilometers per second. Hence, despite the second explosion taking place only seconds later, the two events are still separated by a significant distance.

The light from this cosmic explosion is believed to have reached Earth somewhere between 310 and 350 years ago. It would have shone brightly in the southern hemisphere’s night sky, but human records indicate there was no sighting, likely due to it being obscured by the Sun.