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Trash star 11 EP

HD 50981

RA 103.7804° · Dec -8.4990° · star

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Score breakdown

· 3 badges
11 pts · Trash
Trash 15 pts → Common
  • Hot blue B-type star +6
  • Star +3
  • Main-sequence star +2
Total score 11

4 more points to reach Common.

Badges

  • Star · +3
  • Hot blue B-type star · +6
  • Main-sequence star · +2

Trivia

What it actually is

  • Spectral class. Its spectrum reads B9V — a blue-white B-type star, with a surface tens of thousands of degrees hot and a life measured in tens of millions of years.
  • 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 7.8 it is just past naked-eye reach — ordinary binoculars will pull it in, over in Monoceros.
  • 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 January — 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. ≈ 16.3 million years at Voyager 1's speed (17 km/s).

Properties

absmag
0.533
bv
0.006
constellation
Mon
dist ly
926.5795
luminosity
53.3089
mag
7.8
name
HD 50981
spect
B9V

About HD 50981

HD 50981 is a trash star. It lies about 926.6 light-years from Earth, sits in the constellation Mon, shines at apparent magnitude 7.8 and has spectral type B9V.

Its spectrum reads B9V — a blue-white B-type star, with a surface tens of thousands of degrees hot and a life measured in tens of millions of years.

How to see it

Look for HD 50981 in the constellation Mon. At apparent magnitude 7.8, it is an easy target for binoculars.

Like any astronomical target, HD 50981 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 50981 is a trash star

HD 50981 scores 11 points on Spacedle's rarity scale, which places it in the trash tier. Another 4 points would lift it into a rarer tier.

That score comes from 3 science badges — Star, Hot blue B-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.