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Common star 19 EP

Kaus Borealis

RA 276.9927° · Dec -25.4217° · star

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Score breakdown

· 3 badges
19 pts · Common
Common 24 pts → Uncommon
  • Naked-eye visible +8
  • Has a proper name +8
  • Star +3
Total score 19

5 more points to reach Uncommon.

Badges

  • Star · +3
  • Naked-eye visible · +8
  • Has a proper name · +8

Trivia

Could we get there?

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

Getting there

  • Aboard Voyager 1. ≈ 1.4 million years at Voyager 1's speed (17 km/s).
  • Fastest probe ever. ≈ 122.1 thousand years even at the Parker Solar Probe's 192 km/s.
  • At 10% light speed. ≈ 782 years in a starship at a tenth of light speed.
  • Distance. 78.2 light-years from Earth.

Look-back time

  • Look-back time. The light you'd see left around the year 1948.

Saying hello

  • Say hello. A radio message and its reply would take 156 years round-trip.

How we found it

  • Named. Notable enough to have earned a proper name, not just a catalogue number.

Properties

absmag
0.922
bv
1.025
constellation
Sgr
dist ly
78.1773
mag
2.82
name
Kaus Borealis
named
yes
spect
K1IIIb

About Kaus Borealis

Kaus Borealis is a common star. It lies about 78.2 light-years from Earth, sits in the constellation Sgr, shines at apparent magnitude 2.82 and has spectral type K1IIIb.

Notable enough to have earned a proper name, not just a catalogue number.

How to see it

Look for Kaus Borealis in the constellation Sgr. At apparent magnitude 2.82, it can be glimpsed with the unaided eye under dark skies.

Like any astronomical target, Kaus Borealis 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 Kaus Borealis is a common star

Kaus Borealis scores 19 points on Spacedle's rarity scale, which places it in the common tier. Another 5 points would lift it into a rarer tier.

That score comes from 3 science badges — Star, Naked-eye visible and Has a proper name — 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.

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Sky imagery and survey data courtesy of Aladin Lite & CDS, Strasbourg. Object data from the NASA Exoplanet Archive, JPL Small-Body Database, and the ATNF Pulsar Catalogue.