Can anyone tell me if I am reading these guys wrong or if the writers got it wrong?

 

http://news.yahoo.com/s/space/20070109/sc_space/pillarsofcreationtoppledbystellarblast

 

The part I have trouble with is:

The Eagle Nebula has been studied in infrared wavelengths before, but the new study is the most detailed yet. "What is brand new with Spitzer is that we have access to longer wavelengths," particularly the 70 micron wavelength, Flagey said. "We didn't have access to these wavelengths before."

 

The new Spitzer image suggests one of the stellar time bombs in the Eagle Nebula has already detonated. Humans living 1,000 to 2,000 years ago might have noticed the supernova event that destroyed the pillars as an unusually bright star in the sky.

 

What I don't get....if the light of the nova has hit our sky 1k-2k years ago, wouldn't the light the hubble uses to take these images build photos of that nebula 1k-2k post-explosion?

 

If the light of the nova-event has passed us, then all light containing images of pre-nova conditions has passed by us - by a long time apparently. If we can still see the pillars even through they are gone, then the bright flash of the nova should be in the future right before they can be seen as destroyed - or did I get something really wrong?

well, it would take a lot longer for the shockwave to reach the pillars than the light to reach earth.

The Nova was probably outside of the Pillars but likely inside the Eagle Nebula, which means that the distance between Earth and nova is different than between Earth and Pillars.

 

Secondly, and most important, the shockwave from the supernova is propagating with much lower speed than light.

 

So the flash of the nova passed us in the past, the light from a shockwave close to the Pillars is reaching us now and the light from any leftovers will reach us later.