Black Hole swallows a star: First time ever seen.

[Tellos Athenaios]

Surely if it came from the right direction it would start to suck mass from the sun before we felt it's effects? I'm no physics expert though so I could be totally wrong.

Nope. That's how fields work: the black hole pulls on all mass no matter where it is. Just that its effect on earth will be less than that on the sun because of the sun's greater mass and in this specific scenario lesser distance to the origin of the gravitational “field” of the black hole. However, the fact that the sun gets a worse deal is no consolation if it means our atmosphere is suddenly ripped off, and the earth is given an additional acceleration towards the center of the sun. (because currently the earth's speed is just right to keep it in falling past the sun (i.e. in orbit), rather than falling into the sun, but this depends on the strength of the sun's own gravitational field and (to a far lesser extent) that of the other major bodies in our solar system such as Jupiter and Saturn.

The black hole would essentially upset the balance and if strong enough to rip the atmosphere from our earth it would certainly be strong enough to upset our orbit. Think of how the moon and sun affect tides, then remember that the moon is phase-locked with the earth because the earth's gravitational field essentially created a tide of rock heavy enough to stall the moon's rotation around its axis. Now imagine what a tidal waves in the earth's mantel & outer core could do.

[Papewaio]

Not quite. Unless there is some sort of directed gravity pulse that ripples through the solar system (even then they are going to be less then a hand held gravity meter can measure)... The approaching gravity field will only increase as the black hole approaches... And that would be a gradual affair at first and would have a fairly uniform effect on the entire solar system as a single entity.

And since everything is falling at the same rate the atmosphere won't be falling any faster until the field strength is significantly different fromone side of the planet to the other.

Put it this way we don't personally conciously feel the change in gravity when the tide shifts. It would over a long time have an effect on our solar system... But the tearing off of our atmosphere would require a situation in which the entire solar system is falling in towards the black hole and be at a short distance in astronomy terms... The tides and probably the tectonic plates would show stress far earlier.

[Tellos Athenaios]

Yes. But I understood the question to mean, when we can notice the black hole. I mean, there's a super massive blackhole of roughly similar calibre in the centre of the Milky Way galaxy, one which we already orbit (as a solar system)... but we hardly notice it except IIRC by the gradual movement of Polaris on the northern hemisphere (which is not a constant on the night's sky if you do consider such large timeframes...)

[Fragony]

I feel so small right now

[Veho Nex]

Dude, I've never gotten that feeling. See how small earth is compared to the rest of the multiverse just makes me want to go out and see what has never been seen before. Ive always felt bigger the smaller Im supposed to appear.

[classical_hero]

This sucks.

[PanzerJaeger]

Cut Medicare, but keep funding NASA! (too Backroom?)

[johnhughthom]

Yes. But I understood the question to mean, when we can notice the black hole. I mean, there's a super massive blackhole of roughly similar calibre in the centre of the Milky Way galaxy, one which we already orbit (as a solar system)... but we hardly notice it except IIRC by the gradual movement of Polaris on the northern hemisphere (which is not a constant on the night's sky if you do consider such large timeframes...)

Oh, I didn't realise the article was about a supermassive black hole, I was thinking about a black hole with much less mass.

[Tellos Athenaios]

Oh, I didn't realise the article was about a supermassive black hole, I was thinking about a black hole with much less mass.

The article is about “a black hole” at first then goes on to say...

Based on the wavelengths of light emitted by the flare and the way it evolved over time, the scientists concluded that it originated from matter falling or accreting onto a black hole about 1 million times the mass of the sun, comparable to the supermassive black hole at the heart of the Milky Way.

.

I took that to mean the two black holes are of roughly similar mass.