What star will blow up next?

Explore fascinating insights on live chat discussions about which stars, like Betelgeuse, might explode next. Discover more now!

Written byPhil Plait
| 1 min read
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In the live chat tonight, I was asked when Betelgeuse will explode. The answer is, we don't know. :-) But that made me think about other stars that will blow, almost certainly before Betelgeuse does. I recorded my answer. The stars I mention are Sher 25 and Eta Carinae. For the record, I said that I thought Sher 25 was 6000 light years away; it's actually 6000 parsecs, or 20,000 light years away. I had the number right, but the unit wrong. :-) You can read all you want about Supernova 1987A on my Bitesize Pages, too.

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