They photographed a huge car crash in space

A new image from the Hubble Space Telescope shows three merging galaxies, writes Live Science.

Because of the amazing gravitational interactions, the systems transform each other dramatically.

Similar collisions are quite common, and the Milky Way has experienced such an incident in the past.

While the cosmic crash may seem devastating, it actually involves birth. The material of the three merging galaxies in the middle of the newly formed system promotes the formation of stars.

The trio are collectively referred to as IC 2431, the group is located about 681 million light-years from Earth. The crash was observed as part of the Galaxy Zoo project, in which about 100,000 volunteers rated images of 900,000 galaxies. The study was performed in 175 days, without the help of amateurs, the analysis could have taken years.

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