This illustration of the Comet-Shoemaker/Levy collision shows the first piece of the remains of the comet crashing into Jupiter. This event occurred in 1994 after tidal forces from Jupiter caused the comet to break up into 21 separate pieces. Although on a very different scale, the physical mechanism for the breakup of Shoemaker/Levy also caused the tidal disruption of the star in RX J1242-11. (Illustration: SEDS/D. Seal (edited by CXC/M. Weiss)