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Rare star 46 EP

69 Cet

RA 35.4860° · Dec 0.3957° · star

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Score breakdown

· 7 badges
46 pts · Rare
Rare 50 pts → Epic
  • Intrinsically luminous (Mv < −2) +10
  • Naked-eye visible +8
  • Deep red star +8
  • Distant (over 1,000 light-years) +6
  • Giant star +6
  • Cool red M-type star +5
  • Star +3
Total score 46

4 more points to reach Epic.

Badges

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

Trivia

What it actually is

  • Spectral class. Its spectrum reads M2III — 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 giant. It has already exhausted its core hydrogen and swollen up enormously in response.

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 5.3 you can see it with your own eyes from a dark site, over in Cetus.
  • 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 October — 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. ≈ 18.9 million years at Voyager 1's speed (17 km/s).

Properties

absmag
-2.303
bv
1.648
constellation
Cet
dist ly
1076.4224
luminosity
726.4404
mag
5.29
name
69 Cet
spect
M2III

About 69 Cet

69 Cet is a rare star. It lies about 1,076.4 light-years from Earth, sits in the constellation Cet, shines at apparent magnitude 5.29 and has spectral type M2III.

Its spectrum reads M2III — 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 69 Cet in the constellation Cet. At apparent magnitude 5.29, it can be glimpsed with the unaided eye under dark skies.

Like any astronomical target, 69 Cet 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 69 Cet is a rare star

69 Cet scores 46 points on Spacedle's rarity scale, which places it in the rare tier. Another 4 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, Giant star, 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.