Just the other day our planet was engulfed in an unseen once in a lifetime explosion of stellar origin.

To think that we didn't even notice it because it was so far away, and yet it would have resulted in our complete extinction if it had occurred within 10 light-years of us.

Life is frail in more ways than one...

"The commotion was caused by a special variety of neutron star known as a magnetar. These fast-spinning, compact stellar corpses -- no larger than a big city -- create intense magnetic fields that trigger explosions."

Only the most sensitive scientific instruments could barely detect this monster of an explosion so very far away. Does it then really exist or is it merely a figment of the imagination, an iota in the minds of the so-called scientists?

Don't worry yet, there don't seem to be any magnetars close enough to us, at least none that we know about.

Be careful, just in case.