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Rare star 35 EP

HD 42088

RA 92.4149° · Dec 20.4876° · star

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Score breakdown

· 3 badges
35 pts · Rare
Rare 50 pts → Epic
  • Blazing O-type star +26
  • In Orion's hunting ground +6
  • Star +3
Total score 35

15 more points to reach Epic.

Badges

  • Star · +3
  • In Orion's hunting ground · +6
  • Blazing O-type star · +26

Trivia

What it actually is

  • Spectral class. Its spectrum reads O6 — 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.

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 7.5 it is just past naked-eye reach — ordinary binoculars will pull it in, over in Orion.
  • 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 December — that's when to go looking.

Could we get there?

  • Verdict. Hopelessly far for any craft humanity can build today.

Getting there

  • Aboard Voyager 1. ≈ 17.5 million years at Voyager 1's speed (17 km/s).
  • Fastest probe ever. ≈ 1.6 million years even at the Parker Solar Probe's 192 km/s.

Properties

absmag
0.129
bv
0.014
constellation
Ori
dist ly
994.3779
luminosity
77.3393
mag
7.55
name
HD 42088
spect
O6

About HD 42088

HD 42088 is a rare star. It lies about 994.4 light-years from Earth, sits in the constellation Ori, shines at apparent magnitude 7.55 and has spectral type O6.

Its spectrum reads O6 — 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 42088 in the constellation Ori. At apparent magnitude 7.55, it is an easy target for binoculars.

Like any astronomical target, HD 42088 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 42088 is a rare star

HD 42088 scores 35 points on Spacedle's rarity scale, which places it in the rare tier. Another 15 points would lift it into a rarer tier.

That score comes from 3 science badges — Star, In Orion's hunting ground and Blazing O-type 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.