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Epic variable star 58 EP

HD 167003

RA 273.6756° · Dec -33.1409° · star

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Score breakdown

· 9 badges
58 pts · Epic
Epic 78 pts → Anomaly
  • Supergiant +18
  • Toward the galactic centre +8
  • Distant (over 1,000 light-years) +6
  • Hot blue B-type star +6
  • Variable star +5
  • Blue-white star +5
  • Gently variable +4
  • On the zodiac +3
  • A named variable star +3
Total score 58

20 more points to reach Anomaly.

Badges

  • Variable star · +5
  • Distant (over 1,000 light-years) · +6
  • Toward the galactic centre · +8
  • On the zodiac · +3
  • Hot blue B-type star · +6
  • Supergiant · +18
  • Blue-white star · +5
  • Gently variable · +4
  • A named variable star · +3

Trivia

What it actually is

  • Spectral class. Its spectrum reads B1Ib/II — a blue-white B-type star, with a surface tens of thousands of degrees hot and a life measured in tens of millions of years.
  • Where it is in life. It is a supergiant, hundreds of times wider than the Sun.
  • It changes. This star does not hold still: its brightness rises and falls on a rhythm of hours, days or years, either pulsing in size or being eclipsed by a companion.

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 8.4 it is just past naked-eye reach — ordinary binoculars will pull it in, over in Sagittarius.
  • Southern sky. It rides the southern half of the sky — an easier target the further south you are.
  • Best time of year. It stands highest in the middle of the night around June — that's when to go looking.

Could we get there?

  • Verdict. Impossible with our current technology — and the next millennium of it.

Properties

absmag
-0.459
bv
-0.097
constellation
Sgr
dist ly
1964.7951
luminosity
132.923
mag
8.44
name
HD 167003
spect
B1Ib/II
var amplitude
0.18
var designation
V4386
var max
8.4
var min
8.58

About HD 167003

HD 167003 is an epic variable star. It lies about 1,964.8 light-years from Earth, sits in the constellation Sgr, shines at apparent magnitude 8.44 and has spectral type B1Ib/II.

Its spectrum reads B1Ib/II — a blue-white B-type star, with a surface tens of thousands of degrees hot and a life measured in tens of millions of years.

How to see it

Look for HD 167003 in the constellation Sgr. At apparent magnitude 8.44, it is an easy target for binoculars.

Like any astronomical target, HD 167003 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 HD 167003 is an epic variable star

HD 167003 scores 58 points on Spacedle's rarity scale, which places it in the epic tier. Another 20 points would lift it into a rarer tier.

That score comes from 9 science badges — Variable star, Distant (over 1,000 light-years), Toward the galactic centre, On the zodiac, Hot blue B-type star, Supergiant, Blue-white star and Gently variable — 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.