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Common variable star 17 EP

HD 89143

RA 153.3909° · Dec -73.3345° · star

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Score breakdown

· 4 badges
17 pts · Common
Common 22 pts → Uncommon
  • Variable star +5
  • White A-type star +5
  • Gently variable +4
  • A named variable star +3
Total score 17

5 more points to reach Uncommon.

Badges

  • Variable star · +5
  • White A-type star · +5
  • Gently variable · +4
  • A named variable star · +3

Trivia

What it actually is

  • Spectral class. Its spectrum reads A3mA5-F0 — 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.
  • It changes. This star does not hold still: its brightness rises and falls on a rhythm of hours, days or years, either pulsing in size or being eclipsed by a companion.

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 8.8 it is just past naked-eye reach — ordinary binoculars will pull it in, over in Carina.
  • Southern sky only. So far south it never rises for most of the northern hemisphere. To see it you'd have to travel to Chile, South Africa or Australia.
  • Best time of year. It stands highest in the middle of the night around February — 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. ≈ 15.4 million years at Voyager 1's speed (17 km/s).

Properties

absmag
1.703
bv
0.406
constellation
Car
dist ly
876.7634
luminosity
18.1468
mag
8.85
name
HD 89143
spect
A3mA5-F0
var amplitude
0.16
var designation
V347
var max
8.817
var min
8.977

About HD 89143

HD 89143 is a common variable star. It lies about 876.8 light-years from Earth, sits in the constellation Car, shines at apparent magnitude 8.85 and has spectral type A3mA5-F0.

Its spectrum reads A3mA5-F0 — 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 HD 89143 in the constellation Car. At apparent magnitude 8.85, it is an easy target for binoculars.

Like any astronomical target, HD 89143 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 89143 is a common variable star

HD 89143 scores 17 points on Spacedle's rarity scale, which places it in the common tier. Another 5 points would lift it into a rarer tier.

That score comes from 4 science badges — Variable star, White A-type star, Gently variable and A named variable 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.