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Uncommon star 24 EP

20 Vul

RA 303.0029° · Dec 26.4788° · star

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Score breakdown

· 5 badges
24 pts · Uncommon
Uncommon 34 pts → Rare
  • Naked-eye visible +8
  • Hot blue B-type star +6
  • Blue-white star +5
  • Star +3
  • Main-sequence star +2
Total score 24

10 more points to reach Rare.

Badges

  • Star · +3
  • Naked-eye visible · +8
  • Hot blue B-type star · +6
  • Main-sequence star · +2
  • Blue-white star · +5

Trivia

What it actually is

  • Spectral class. Its spectrum reads B7Ve... — 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 on the main sequence, quietly fusing hydrogen in its core exactly as the Sun does.

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 5.9 you can see it with your own eyes from a dark site, over in Vulpecula.
  • Northern sky. It rides the northern half of the sky — an easier target the further north 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. Hopelessly far for any craft humanity can build today.

Getting there

  • Aboard Voyager 1. ≈ 14.2 million years at Voyager 1's speed (17 km/s).

Properties

absmag
-1.053
bv
-0.107
constellation
Vul
dist ly
805.3235
luminosity
229.7206
mag
5.91
name
20 Vul
spect
B7Ve...

About 20 Vul

20 Vul is an uncommon star. It lies about 805.3 light-years from Earth, sits in the constellation Vul, shines at apparent magnitude 5.91 and has spectral type B7Ve....

Its spectrum reads B7Ve... — 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 20 Vul in the constellation Vul. At apparent magnitude 5.91, it can be glimpsed with the unaided eye under dark skies.

Like any astronomical target, 20 Vul 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 20 Vul is an uncommon star

20 Vul scores 24 points on Spacedle's rarity scale, which places it in the uncommon tier. Another 10 points would lift it into a rarer tier.

That score comes from 5 science badges — Star, Naked-eye visible, Hot blue B-type star, Main-sequence star and Blue-white 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.