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Epic star 52 EP

5 Lac

RA 337.3826° · Dec 47.7069° · star

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Score breakdown

· 7 badges
52 pts · Epic
Epic 78 pts → Anomaly
  • Bright giant +12
  • Intrinsically luminous (Mv < −2) +10
  • Naked-eye visible +8
  • Deep red star +8
  • Distant (over 1,000 light-years) +6
  • Cool red M-type star +5
  • Star +3
Total score 52

26 more points to reach Anomaly.

Badges

  • Star · +3
  • Distant (over 1,000 light-years) · +6
  • Naked-eye visible · +8
  • Cool red M-type star · +5
  • Bright giant · +12
  • Deep red star · +8
  • Intrinsically luminous (Mv < −2) · +10

Trivia

What it actually is

  • Spectral class. Its spectrum reads M0II — an M-type red star — and M stars are the silent majority: roughly three of every four stars in the galaxy are one.
  • Where it is in life. It is a bright giant, well on its way to the largest stars there are.

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 4.3 you can see it with your own eyes from a dark site, over in Lacerta.
  • 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 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. ≈ 28.9 million years at Voyager 1's speed (17 km/s).

Properties

absmag
-4.177
bv
1.679
constellation
Lac
dist ly
1647.2525
luminosity
4081.3139
mag
4.34
name
5 Lac
spect
M0II

About 5 Lac

5 Lac is an epic star. It lies about 1,647.3 light-years from Earth, sits in the constellation Lac, shines at apparent magnitude 4.34 and has spectral type M0II.

Its spectrum reads M0II — an M-type red star — and M stars are the silent majority: roughly three of every four stars in the galaxy are one.

How to see it

Look for 5 Lac in the constellation Lac. At apparent magnitude 4.34, it can be glimpsed with the unaided eye under dark skies.

Like any astronomical target, 5 Lac 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 5 Lac is an epic star

5 Lac scores 52 points on Spacedle's rarity scale, which places it in the epic tier. Another 26 points would lift it into a rarer tier.

That score comes from 7 science badges — Star, Distant (over 1,000 light-years), Naked-eye visible, Cool red M-type star, Bright giant, Deep red star and Intrinsically luminous (Mv < −2) — 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.