Betelgeuse: rare astronomical phenomenon will obscure the star in December

A very rare astronomical event will occur on the night between December 11 and December 12: The asteroid named 319 Leona is approximately 60 km in diameter. It will pass directly in front of the red supergiant star Betelgeuse in the constellation Orion. and the tenth brightest star in our night sky.

Betelgeuse, a name that can be translated as “giant’s armpit,” is a majestic star that exhibits a red color in angular diameter, ranking second in the sky excluding the Sun. It is likely that it is “one step away” from going supernova due to its evolutionary stage, but we do not know whether this will happen decades later or 100,000 years from now. And these are doubts making the star being occluded by the asteroid a special moment..

Ironically, astronomers explain: The asteroid’s passage will trap 94% of Betelgeuse’s light, making it an ordinary star. This is fundamental due to the variable brightness caused by huge convection cells that carry heat from the core to the surface and change its brightness.

Global astronomy project to observe Betelgeuse

On September 13, a group of researchers observed Leona’s previous occultation of an unnamed star to determine the asteroid’s projected shape and size. In preparation for the big event on December 12. The star’s fame and mysteries turn the event into a global astronomy project.

“In the vast majority of stellar occultations, the diameters of stars are very small compared to the angular size of the solar system body passing in front of them,” according to the authors of this previous study, hosted on the online preprint repository arXiv. This means that the obfuscations are not gradual.

The study warns that in the case of Betelgeuse, the large angular diameter of the red giant can lead to a different phenomenon than “partial eclipse” and “total eclipse”, as long as the angular diameter of the asteroid is large enough compared to that of the star.

How to observe the asteroid hiding Betelgeuse

Before the tips it is important to know Only those living in a privileged corridor stretching from Central Asia and Southern Europe to Florida and Mexico will be able to see the show in full.This means that the phenomenon cannot be observed much in Brazil.

Hiding is planned Until December 11 at 10:17 pm (Brasília time) and just look at the sky towards Betelgeuse to see it., should flash for a few minutes. For those who want a more precise result, there are two apps that trigger your mobile phone’s camera flash at a scheduled time: Occult Flash Tag (Android) and AstroFlashTimer (iPhone).

Stay informed about astronomical events on TecMundo. If you want, take the opportunity to learn a little more about the Orion constellation and its mysteries.