Betelguese getting some attention for dimming
Discussion
Scabutz said:
I cant believe we are talking about a star on the shoulder of Orion and no one has mentioned attack ships on fire yet.
Seriously thought I saw this news on Twitter this morning. I also got excited like someone above until i saw it might be 100,000 years away, also it may have already happened - blows my mind to think I could have happened back when we were fighting the French at Agincourt but the light hasn't reached us yet. I went out to have a look earlier. I always look for Orion on a clear night, must be one of the most recognisable constellations there is. Does seem to me that it looks dimmer, but perhaps that is just confirmation bias.
Betelguese is thought to be 500 to 600 Light Years away - definitely not "100,000 years", unless you are planning on going there by spacecraft. Seriously thought I saw this news on Twitter this morning. I also got excited like someone above until i saw it might be 100,000 years away, also it may have already happened - blows my mind to think I could have happened back when we were fighting the French at Agincourt but the light hasn't reached us yet. I went out to have a look earlier. I always look for Orion on a clear night, must be one of the most recognisable constellations there is. Does seem to me that it looks dimmer, but perhaps that is just confirmation bias.
Eric Mc said:
Scabutz said:
I cant believe we are talking about a star on the shoulder of Orion and no one has mentioned attack ships on fire yet.
Seriously thought I saw this news on Twitter this morning. I also got excited like someone above until i saw it might be 100,000 years away, also it may have already happened - blows my mind to think I could have happened back when we were fighting the French at Agincourt but the light hasn't reached us yet. I went out to have a look earlier. I always look for Orion on a clear night, must be one of the most recognisable constellations there is. Does seem to me that it looks dimmer, but perhaps that is just confirmation bias.
Betelguese is thought to be 500 to 600 Light Years away - definitely not "100,000 years", unless you are planning on going there by spacecraft. Seriously thought I saw this news on Twitter this morning. I also got excited like someone above until i saw it might be 100,000 years away, also it may have already happened - blows my mind to think I could have happened back when we were fighting the French at Agincourt but the light hasn't reached us yet. I went out to have a look earlier. I always look for Orion on a clear night, must be one of the most recognisable constellations there is. Does seem to me that it looks dimmer, but perhaps that is just confirmation bias.
Scabutz said:
I cant believe we are talking about a star on the shoulder of Orion and no one has mentioned attack ships on fire yet.
Seriously thought I saw this news on Twitter this morning. I also got excited like someone above until i saw it might be 100,000 years away, also it may have already happened - blows my mind to think I could have happened back when we were fighting the French at Agincourt but the light hasn't reached us yet. I went out to have a look earlier. I always look for Orion on a clear night, must be one of the most recognisable constellations there is. Does seem to me that it looks dimmer, but perhaps that is just confirmation bias.
It is a young star, and a large star, going one what they know (the ubiquitous they and not from my fag pack calculations), time frame to pop is 100,000 years. That is anytime now and a short space of time as far as the universe is concerned. I have one bit of software saying 429ly and another saying 497ly distant (there should be an error in there +/- stuff). But that is probably due to the catalogue being used. Other sources say 600 or plus or minus.Seriously thought I saw this news on Twitter this morning. I also got excited like someone above until i saw it might be 100,000 years away, also it may have already happened - blows my mind to think I could have happened back when we were fighting the French at Agincourt but the light hasn't reached us yet. I went out to have a look earlier. I always look for Orion on a clear night, must be one of the most recognisable constellations there is. Does seem to me that it looks dimmer, but perhaps that is just confirmation bias.
Going to guess the peeps in the know, know a bit about how the star keeps it shape, mass and how much it burns. Lots to go on from the spectra and other bits. From that they have done a fag packet calculation on how long the star can keep fission going before the fuel runs out and gravity does its stuff. It is a young fast burning star, ours is 4.5 billion years old or so, Betelgeuse is 8 million years old give or take.
https://www.universetoday.com/144465/waiting-for-b...
Probably got stuff wrong. Distance measurement is interesting.
But anything we see in the night sky is in the past, Sun is 8 minutes. Your TV from a satellite is delayed cos light speed, as is your TV from the US or Japan. Not a lot but watch a picture pre and post and the delay is obvious for a satellite feed (26,000 miles or so there then the same back), less obvious on a few thousand miles on fibre. Take that out further and obviously c shows its limits.
I obviously misunderstood. Even using 100,000 from now as the predictive time for the event is nonsense as nobody actually knows how these things work when it comes to time scales. We haven't had a supernova in our own galaxy since the early 17 century - and of course, observational techniques back then were extremely primitive i.e. no telescopes etc.
The nearest supernova we've been able to observe in modern times was SN1987a which occurred in one of the satellite galaxies known as the Magellanic Cloud -
.
All other supernovae studied have been in distant galaxies which makes them harder to study. The main issue with these distances is that it is impossible to study stars in their final pre-supernova stage as they are just too dim to be seen. We only find out that they are a supernova the moment the supernova occurs.
The good thing about what is happening to Betelgeuse now is that the ability to study the star using optical and other wavelength telescopes is massively more sophisticated than it was even 20 years ago. Hopefully we will learn a lot about this star. However, whether this is a precursor to it blowing itself to pieces is pure speculation and not based on any real science.
The nearest supernova we've been able to observe in modern times was SN1987a which occurred in one of the satellite galaxies known as the Magellanic Cloud -
. All other supernovae studied have been in distant galaxies which makes them harder to study. The main issue with these distances is that it is impossible to study stars in their final pre-supernova stage as they are just too dim to be seen. We only find out that they are a supernova the moment the supernova occurs.
The good thing about what is happening to Betelgeuse now is that the ability to study the star using optical and other wavelength telescopes is massively more sophisticated than it was even 20 years ago. Hopefully we will learn a lot about this star. However, whether this is a precursor to it blowing itself to pieces is pure speculation and not based on any real science.
budgie smuggler said:
Excellent article and very interesting read, thanks.ash73 said:
If I bothered to go outside to have a look I just know this would happen:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QeduBcf_hPM
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QeduBcf_hPM
AshVX220 said:
budgie smuggler said:
Excellent article and very interesting read, thanks.Scabutz said:
Indeed. Highlights that all is not clear. We know it will die soonn, astronomically speaking, we know its dimmer, but we dont really known WTF is happening with it.
Indeed, but from the chart it is doing something outside it's normal cycle from our observations so far (though obviously a few hundred years is nothing in cosmic terms).Looks like it's brightening again fairly rapidly
https://twitter.com/chmn_victor/status/12226507931...
https://twitter.com/chmn_victor/status/12226507931...
Scabutz said:
So what's happening. Is it going supernova? Has Bruce Willis landed on it and is going to blow it up?
Ride home the other night sky was clear and I stopped for a look. It was very dim.
One theory is it is blasting off some mass. It is energetic.Ride home the other night sky was clear and I stopped for a look. It was very dim.
But still dimming it would seem.
Frim here https://www.aavso.org/LCGv2/
I was looking at it the other night and it is indeed quite a bit dimmer than it used to be. A good comparison is Aldeberan, which is also a red giant and not too far in the sky from Betelgeuse. For most of my life they have appeared more or less equal in brightness. Not at the moment. Betelgeuse is less than half as bright I would guess.
Eric Mc said:
I was looking at it the other night and it is indeed quite a bit dimmer than it used to be. A good comparison is Aldeberan, which is also a red giant and not too far in the sky from Betelgeuse. For most of my life they have appeared more or less equal in brightness. Not at the moment. Betelgeuse is less than half as bright I would guess.
It appears 37% as bright as usual 
ETA- struggling to link the image, https://twitter.com/betelbot/ is the source
Edited by budgie smuggler on Friday 31st January 09:15
Edited by budgie smuggler on Friday 31st January 09:16
ash73 said:
Gandahar said:
Out of interest whats the science for 100 000 years estimate?
See 3.4.1https://iopscience.iop.org/article/10.3847/0004-63...
"Our best guess is that the star will supernova in less than ~100,000 yr (even longer in the EG model). "
Starts off
"best guess"
then says "less than"
followed by ~ (approximately) ... make your mind up
Then says " even longer "....
All in one sentence !!!!!
When I was doing my astronomy degree, in a polytechnic just outside a shed near Watford, my astronomy lecturers would have given me a poor mark if I had submitted that guff.
Bring back an error factor +/- like the good old days....
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