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Epic variable star 63 EP

HR 4895

RA 193.5917° · Dec -58.4306° · star

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Score breakdown

· 8 badges
63 pts · Epic
Epic 78 pts → Anomaly
  • Supergiant +18
  • Intrinsically luminous (Mv < −2) +10
  • Strongly variable +10
  • Under the Southern Cross +8
  • Distant (over 1,000 light-years) +6
  • Variable star +5
  • Yellow-white F-type star +3
  • A named variable star +3
Total score 63

15 more points to reach Anomaly.

Badges

  • Variable star · +5
  • Distant (over 1,000 light-years) · +6
  • Under the Southern Cross · +8
  • Yellow-white F-type star · +3
  • Supergiant · +18
  • Intrinsically luminous (Mv < −2) · +10
  • Strongly variable · +10
  • A named variable star · +3

Trivia

What it actually is

  • Spectral class. Its spectrum reads F7Ib/II — an F-type star — a little hotter, whiter and shorter-lived than the Sun.
  • Where it is in life. It is a supergiant, hundreds of times wider than the Sun.
  • 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 6.7 it is just past naked-eye reach — ordinary binoculars will pull it in, over in Crux.
  • Southern sky. It rides the southern half of the sky — an easier target the further south you are.
  • Best time of year. It stands highest in the middle of the night around April — that's when to go looking.

Could we get there?

  • Verdict. Impossible with our current technology — and the next millennium of it.

Properties

absmag
-2.483
bv
0.55
constellation
Cru
dist ly
2280.8112
luminosity
857.4326
mag
6.74
name
HR 4895
spect
F7Ib/II
var amplitude
0.76
var designation
S
var max
6.198
var min
6.958

About HR 4895

HR 4895 is an epic variable star. It lies about 2,280.8 light-years from Earth, sits in the constellation Cru, shines at apparent magnitude 6.74 and has spectral type F7Ib/II.

Its spectrum reads F7Ib/II — an F-type star — a little hotter, whiter and shorter-lived than the Sun.

How to see it

Look for HR 4895 in the constellation Cru. At apparent magnitude 6.74, it is an easy target for binoculars.

Like any astronomical target, HR 4895 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 4895 is an epic variable star

HR 4895 scores 63 points on Spacedle's rarity scale, which places it in the epic tier. Another 15 points would lift it into a rarer tier.

That score comes from 8 science badges — Variable star, Distant (over 1,000 light-years), Under the Southern Cross, Yellow-white F-type star, Supergiant, Intrinsically luminous (Mv < −2), Strongly 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.