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Uncommon star 25 EP

The TrA

RA 248.9366° · Dec -65.4954° · star

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Score breakdown

· 4 badges
25 pts · Uncommon
Uncommon 34 pts → Rare
  • Naked-eye visible +8
  • Sun-like G-type star +8
  • Giant star +6
  • Star +3
Total score 25

9 more points to reach Rare.

Badges

  • Star · +3
  • Naked-eye visible · +8
  • Sun-like G-type star · +8
  • Giant star · +6

Trivia

What it actually is

  • Spectral class. Its spectrum reads G8/K0III — a G-type star: the very same spectral class as our own Sun.

Sense of scale

  • In perspective. Far away by human standards, yet still a local address inside the Milky Way's spiral arms.

Find it in the sky

  • How to spot it. At magnitude 5.5 you can see it with your own eyes from a dark site, over in Triangulum Australe.
  • Southern sky only. So far south it never rises for most of the northern hemisphere. To see it you'd have to travel to Chile, South Africa or Australia.
  • Best time of year. It stands highest in the middle of the night around May — that's when to go looking.

Could we get there?

  • Verdict. Hopelessly far for any craft humanity can build today.

Getting there

  • Aboard Voyager 1. ≈ 6 million years at Voyager 1's speed (17 km/s).
  • Fastest probe ever. ≈ 534.4 thousand years even at the Parker Solar Probe's 192 km/s.

Properties

absmag
0.395
bv
0.949
constellation
TrA
dist ly
342.2414
luminosity
60.5341
mag
5.5
name
The TrA
spect
G8/K0III

About The TrA

The TrA is an uncommon star. It lies about 342.2 light-years from Earth, sits in the constellation TrA, shines at apparent magnitude 5.5 and has spectral type G8/K0III.

Its spectrum reads G8/K0III — a G-type star: the very same spectral class as our own Sun.

How to see it

Look for The TrA in the constellation TrA. At apparent magnitude 5.5, it can be glimpsed with the unaided eye under dark skies.

Like any astronomical target, The TrA is best seen from a dark site away from city lights, and when it is above the horizon depends on your latitude and the time of year. The visibility panel above works out tonight's viewing window for your saved location.

Why The TrA is an uncommon star

The TrA scores 25 points on Spacedle's rarity scale, which places it in the uncommon tier. Another 9 points would lift it into a rarer tier.

That score comes from 4 science badges — Star, Naked-eye visible, Sun-like G-type star and Giant star — each earned for a real, measurable property of the object. Rarity on Spacedle is never random: the more remarkable an object's astrophysics, the more badges it collects, the higher it scores, and the rarer it ranks.