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Trash star 6 EP

HD 186909

RA 296.8693° · Dec -9.6803° · star

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Score breakdown

· 2 badges
6 pts · Trash
Trash 15 pts → Common
  • Star +3
  • Yellow-white F-type star +3
Total score 6

9 more points to reach Common.

Badges

  • Star · +3
  • Yellow-white F-type star · +3

Trivia

What it actually is

  • Spectral class. Its spectrum reads F8 — 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 8.9 it is just past naked-eye reach — ordinary binoculars will pull it in, over in Aquila.
  • Seen from everywhere. It sits almost on the celestial equator, so it can be seen from essentially anywhere on Earth.
  • 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. Hopelessly far for any craft humanity can build today.

Getting there

  • Aboard Voyager 1. ≈ 5.2 million years at Voyager 1's speed (17 km/s).
  • Fastest probe ever. ≈ 463.8 thousand years even at the Parker Solar Probe's 192 km/s.

Properties

absmag
4.063
bv
0.552
constellation
Aql
dist ly
297.0456
luminosity
2.0644
mag
8.86
name
HD 186909
spect
F8

About HD 186909

HD 186909 is a trash star. It lies about 297 light-years from Earth, sits in the constellation Aql, shines at apparent magnitude 8.86 and has spectral type F8.

Its spectrum reads F8 — an F-type star — a little hotter, whiter and shorter-lived than the Sun.

How to see it

Look for HD 186909 in the constellation Aql. At apparent magnitude 8.86, it is an easy target for binoculars.

Like any astronomical target, HD 186909 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 186909 is a trash star

HD 186909 scores 6 points on Spacedle's rarity scale, which places it in the trash tier. Another 9 points would lift it into a rarer tier.

That score comes from 2 science badges — Star and Yellow-white F-type 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.