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Rare star 41 EP

HD 18326

RA 44.8466° · Dec 60.5665° · star

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Score breakdown

· 5 badges
41 pts · Rare
Rare 50 pts → Epic
  • Blazing O-type star +26
  • Distant (over 1,000 light-years) +6
  • Never sets (northern circumpolar) +4
  • Star +3
  • Main-sequence star +2
Total score 41

9 more points to reach Epic.

Badges

  • Star · +3
  • Distant (over 1,000 light-years) · +6
  • Never sets (northern circumpolar) · +4
  • Blazing O-type star · +26
  • Main-sequence star · +2

Trivia

What it actually is

  • Spectral class. Its spectrum reads O7V — an O-type star — the hottest, rarest main class there is. Fewer than one star in a million is an O, and none of them lasts long.
  • 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 7.9 it is just past naked-eye reach — ordinary binoculars will pull it in, over in Cassiopeia.
  • Never sets. So far north that from Britain, Canada or northern Europe it never dips below the horizon — it is up every clear night of the year.
  • Best time of year. It stands highest in the middle of the night around November — 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. ≈ 23.4 million years at Voyager 1's speed (17 km/s).

Properties

absmag
-0.124
bv
0.301
constellation
Cas
dist ly
1331.2491
luminosity
97.6338
mag
7.93
name
HD 18326
spect
O7V

About HD 18326

HD 18326 is a rare star. It lies about 1,331.2 light-years from Earth, sits in the constellation Cas, shines at apparent magnitude 7.93 and has spectral type O7V.

Its spectrum reads O7V — an O-type star — the hottest, rarest main class there is. Fewer than one star in a million is an O, and none of them lasts long.

How to see it

Look for HD 18326 in the constellation Cas. At apparent magnitude 7.93, it is an easy target for binoculars.

Like any astronomical target, HD 18326 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 18326 is a rare star

HD 18326 scores 41 points on Spacedle's rarity scale, which places it in the rare tier. Another 9 points would lift it into a rarer tier.

That score comes from 5 science badges — Star, Distant (over 1,000 light-years), Never sets (northern circumpolar), Blazing O-type star and Main-sequence 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.