1. Scientists release first-ever image of black hole For the first time, astronomers released an image of a black hole — something that has eluded scientists for more than half a century. An international effort involving eight radio observatories across four continents observed the black hole located in Messier 87, a large galaxy some 55 million light-years away from Earth, over 10 days in April 2017. But it took two years of computer analysis to piece together the image, which was released in April this year.