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Epic star 50 EP

HR 964

RA 48.9499° · Dec 57.1406° · star

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Score breakdown

· 6 badges
50 pts · Epic
Epic 78 pts → Anomaly
  • Supergiant +18
  • Intrinsically luminous (Mv < −2) +10
  • Naked-eye visible +8
  • Distant (over 1,000 light-years) +6
  • White A-type star +5
  • Star +3
Total score 50

28 more points to reach Anomaly.

Badges

  • Star · +3
  • Distant (over 1,000 light-years) · +6
  • Naked-eye visible · +8
  • White A-type star · +5
  • Supergiant · +18
  • Intrinsically luminous (Mv < −2) · +10

Trivia

What it actually is

  • Spectral class. Its spectrum reads A0Ia — an A-type star: white-hot, typically about twice the Sun's mass, and the class most of the sky's famous bright stars belong to.
  • Where it is in life. It is a luminous supergiant — among the largest and rarest stars in the galaxy.

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 5.8 you can see it with your own eyes from a dark site, over in Perseus.
  • 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 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. ≈ 50.3 million years at Voyager 1's speed (17 km/s).

Properties

absmag
-3.925
bv
0.644
constellation
Per
dist ly
2861.0176
luminosity
3235.9366
mag
5.79
name
HR 964
spect
A0Ia

About HR 964

HR 964 is an epic star. It lies about 2,861 light-years from Earth, sits in the constellation Per, shines at apparent magnitude 5.79 and has spectral type A0Ia.

Its spectrum reads A0Ia — an A-type star: white-hot, typically about twice the Sun's mass, and the class most of the sky's famous bright stars belong to.

How to see it

Look for HR 964 in the constellation Per. At apparent magnitude 5.79, it can be glimpsed with the unaided eye under dark skies.

Like any astronomical target, HR 964 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 HR 964 is an epic star

HR 964 scores 50 points on Spacedle's rarity scale, which places it in the epic tier. Another 28 points would lift it into a rarer tier.

That score comes from 6 science badges — Star, Distant (over 1,000 light-years), Naked-eye visible, White A-type star, Supergiant 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.