These cosmic pillars were already dead when Hubble photographed them in 1995. | 123 Cosmic Facts

Added: 2026-05-06

[00:00:00]These cosmic pillars were already dead when Hubble photographed them in 1995.

[00:00:06]The pillars of creation sit 6,500 light years away in the Eagle Nebula. When Hubble captured them in 1995, those photons had traveled through space for millennia. But the pillars themselves may have been destroyed by a supernova we haven't even seen yet.

[00:00:25]In 2022, the James Webb Space Telescope revealed something Hubble never could.

[00:00:31]Thousands of baby stars forming hidden inside these columns, shrouded in dust too thick for visible light to penetrate.

[00:00:40]That supernova that likely obliterated the pillars, it probably happened centuries ago. We're looking at a cosmic ghost. Structures that no longer exist.

[00:00:52]Watching stars being born in rubble we can't see with our eyes. Are the pillars of creation still out there or already gone?