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Common star 17 EP

HD 1557

RA 4.9235° · Dec -30.6586° · star

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Score breakdown

· 4 badges
17 pts · Common
Common 22 pts → Uncommon
  • Distant (over 1,000 light-years) +6
  • Subgiant (leaving the main sequence) +5
  • Star +3
  • Yellow-white F-type star +3
Total score 17

5 more points to reach Uncommon.

Badges

  • Star · +3
  • Distant (over 1,000 light-years) · +6
  • Yellow-white F-type star · +3
  • Subgiant (leaving the main sequence) · +5

Trivia

What it actually is

  • Spectral class. Its spectrum reads F3/F5IV/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 9.1 you'll want a small backyard telescope, over in Sculptor.
  • 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 September — 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. ≈ 19.4 million years at Voyager 1's speed (17 km/s).
  • Fastest probe ever. ≈ 1.7 million years even at the Parker Solar Probe's 192 km/s.

Properties

absmag
1.496
bv
0.495
constellation
Scl
dist ly
1101.8783
luminosity
21.9584
mag
9.14
name
HD 1557
spect
F3/F5IV/V

About HD 1557

HD 1557 is a common star. It lies about 1,101.9 light-years from Earth, sits in the constellation Scl, shines at apparent magnitude 9.14 and has spectral type F3/F5IV/V.

Its spectrum reads F3/F5IV/V — an F-type star — a little hotter, whiter and shorter-lived than the Sun.

How to see it

Look for HD 1557 in the constellation Scl. At apparent magnitude 9.14, a small backyard telescope will bring it into view.

Like any astronomical target, HD 1557 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 1557 is a common star

HD 1557 scores 17 points on Spacedle's rarity scale, which places it in the common tier. Another 5 points would lift it into a rarer tier.

That score comes from 4 science badges — Star, Distant (over 1,000 light-years), Yellow-white F-type star and Subgiant (leaving the main sequence) — 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.