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Uncommon star 25 EP

HD 179117

RA 288.1839° · Dec -33.8462° · star

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Score breakdown

· 6 badges
25 pts · Uncommon
Uncommon 34 pts → Rare
  • Toward the galactic centre +8
  • Distant (over 1,000 light-years) +6
  • Star +3
  • On the zodiac +3
  • Yellow-white F-type star +3
  • Main-sequence star +2
Total score 25

9 more points to reach Rare.

Badges

  • Star · +3
  • Distant (over 1,000 light-years) · +6
  • Toward the galactic centre · +8
  • On the zodiac · +3
  • Yellow-white F-type star · +3
  • Main-sequence star · +2

Trivia

What it actually is

  • Spectral class. Its spectrum reads F0:V — an F-type star — a little hotter, whiter and shorter-lived than the 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 7.3 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 July — that's when to go looking.

Could we get there?

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

Getting there

  • Aboard Voyager 1. ≈ 40.1 million years at Voyager 1's speed (17 km/s).
  • Fastest probe ever. ≈ 3.6 million years even at the Parker Solar Probe's 192 km/s.

Properties

absmag
-1.963
bv
0.362
constellation
Sgr
dist ly
2280.8112
luminosity
531.129
mag
7.26
name
HD 179117
spect
F0:V

About HD 179117

HD 179117 is an uncommon star. It lies about 2,280.8 light-years from Earth, sits in the constellation Sgr, shines at apparent magnitude 7.26 and has spectral type F0:V.

Its spectrum reads F0:V — an F-type star — a little hotter, whiter and shorter-lived than the Sun.

How to see it

Look for HD 179117 in the constellation Sgr. At apparent magnitude 7.26, it is an easy target for binoculars.

Like any astronomical target, HD 179117 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 179117 is an uncommon star

HD 179117 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 6 science badges — Star, Distant (over 1,000 light-years), Toward the galactic centre, On the zodiac, Yellow-white F-type star and Main-sequence 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.