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Rare star 35 EP

HD 199997

RA 315.9464° · Dec -63.4809° · star

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Score breakdown

· 4 badges
35 pts · Rare
Rare 50 pts → Epic
  • Supergiant +18
  • Sun-like G-type star +8
  • Distant (over 1,000 light-years) +6
  • Star +3
Total score 35

15 more points to reach Epic.

Badges

  • Star · +3
  • Distant (over 1,000 light-years) · +6
  • Sun-like G-type star · +8
  • Supergiant · +18

Trivia

What it actually is

  • Spectral class. Its spectrum reads G3Iab: — a G-type star: the very same spectral class as our own Sun.
  • Where it is in life. It is a supergiant. Drop it where the Sun is and its surface would engulf the inner planets.

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 7.7 it is just past naked-eye reach — ordinary binoculars will pull it in, over in Pavo.
  • Southern sky only. So far south it never rises for most of the northern hemisphere. To see it you'd have to travel to Chile, South Africa or Australia.
  • Best time of year. It stands highest in the middle of the night around August — 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. ≈ 34.1 million years at Voyager 1's speed (17 km/s).

Properties

absmag
-1.203
bv
0.834
constellation
Pav
dist ly
1941.4048
luminosity
263.7546
mag
7.67
name
HD 199997
spect
G3Iab:

About HD 199997

HD 199997 is a rare star. It lies about 1,941.4 light-years from Earth, sits in the constellation Pav, shines at apparent magnitude 7.67 and has spectral type G3Iab:.

Its spectrum reads G3Iab: — a G-type star: the very same spectral class as our own Sun.

How to see it

Look for HD 199997 in the constellation Pav. At apparent magnitude 7.67, it is an easy target for binoculars.

Like any astronomical target, HD 199997 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 199997 is a rare star

HD 199997 scores 35 points on Spacedle's rarity scale, which places it in the rare tier. Another 15 points would lift it into a rarer tier.

That score comes from 4 science badges — Star, Distant (over 1,000 light-years), Sun-like G-type star and Supergiant — 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.