Identification of kick velocity large enough for individual gravitational wave event following binary black hole merger

A team of researchers from the Max Planck Institute for Gravitational Physics in Germany and multiple institutions in the U.S. has identified a kick velocity large enough for an individual gravitational wave event after observing a binary black hole merger—a first. In their paper published in the journal Physical Review Letters, the group describes their study of the binary black hole merger GW200129_065458 (now called GW200129) and using models to estimate its recoil velocity.