Thursday, June 11, 2009

Beetlejuice, Beetlejuice, Be.....

It is quite possible that Betelgeuse is going to go supernova. Foxnews Science reports that the famous star has shrunk in size dramatically:

The red giant Betelgeuse, once so large it would reach out to Jupiter's orbit if placed in our own solar system, has shrunk by 15 percent over the past decade in a half, although it's just as bright as it's ever been.

"To see this change is very striking," said retired Berkeley physics professor Charles Townes, who won the 1964 Nobel Prize for inventing the laser. "We will be watching it carefully over the next few years to see if it will keep contracting or will go back up in size."

The Red Giant is nearing the end of its life and may be headed for a dramatic end. We could be in for something like SN1054 that was recorded in the year 1054 by astronomers and then became known as the Crab Nebula.

3 comments:

  1. Anonymous12:25 AM

    Yes, we will be vaporized starting Sept 6, 2012.
    This was predicted in the Sybilline Oracle book 5.
    The whole solar system is going to be scrambled and all the constellations will be blown in to a new place. The Pleides and Sirius are going bye bye and so is our sun.
    Get ready to fry.

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  2. At least according to Roland Emmerich, anyway.

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