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Why did this gamma-ray burst's brightest light come late?
Yu-Han Yang, Roberto Ricci, Eleonora Troja, Muskan Yadav, Yi-Han Iris Yin, Rubén Sánchez-Ramírez, Brendan O'Connor, Niccoló Passaleva, Alberto J. Castro-Tirado, Hendrik van Eerten, Simone Dichiara, Vincenzo Galluzzi, Narjes Shahamat Dehsorkh, Iván Agudo, Jesús Aceituno, Malte Busmann, María D. Caballero-García, Emilio Fernández-García, Daniel Gruen, Maria Gritsevich, Sergiy Guziy, David Hiriart, You-Dong Hu, Martin Jelínek, Alexander Kutyrev, Alzbeta Malenakova, Filip Novotny, Ignacio Pérez-García, Shashi B. Pandey, Jorma Ryske, Alfredo Sota, Jan Strobl, Hira Waseem, Siyu Wu
May 22, 2026
GRB 260310A was a weak explosion that somehow produced an extraordinarily bright X-ray and optical afterglow with a delayed, slow rise to peak. The team argues this paradox vanishes if the jet was pointed away from Earth. Radio observations confirm both reverse and forward shocks, while late-time rebrightening tracked for 68 days suggests an even narrower jet core, implying extreme energies for viewers directly in line.
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