After 80 years of wait, T Coronae Borealis explosion to be visible in 2024

In the next few days or weeks, star T Coronae Borealis or Blaze Star is expected to be visible in the night sky . As a stellar explosion, its appearance will be bright and brief but a sight which the enthusiasts would not want to miss.

As a binary system, T Coronae Borealis or T CrB is not one star but two: a white dwarf and a red giant. In short, when a main sequence star like our Sun runs out of hydrogen in its core, it begins to collapse over billions of years.

Once diminished to its core, it becomes a white dwarf, a dead star.

In an orbit with one another, the white dwarf accumulates the red giant’s hydrogen. A build-up of pressure and heat sets off a thermonuclear explosion every 80 years strong enough to travel 2,600 years to reach our dimension.

The T Coronae Borealis nova, not supernova, will occur once in a lifetime for most humans.

A once in a lifetime event for amateurs and researchers alike

T Coronae Borealis, 3,000 light years away from Earth, is a small constellation of seven stars normally invisible from Earth.

However, the impending celestial event doesn’t concern the whole constellation but rather the “Northern Crown,” the binary system within the group. The brightest star in the group is Alphecca.

First recorded centuries ago, the last T CrB nova occurred in 1946. Few recurrent novae with short life cycles exist, furthermore, one powerful enough to reach us, so the rare stellar show inspires amateurs and researchers alike.

“It’s a once-in-a-lifetime event that will create a lot of new astronomers. Giving young people a cosmic event they can observe for themselves, ask their own questions, and collect their own data,” said Dr. Rebekah Hounsel, an assistant research scientist specializing in nova events at NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Maryland.

“It’ll fuel the next generation of scientists.”

For space researchers , as a close occurrence, the explosion offers a rare window to study “the various wavelengths hopefully giving them data to start unlocking the structure and specific processes involved.”

“We can’t wait to get the full picture of what’s going on,” said Dr. Elizabeth Hays, chief of the Astroparticle Physics Laboratory at NASA Goddard.

As technology has advanced in the past 80 years, researchers are set to obtain new insights into the lifecycles of binary systems and the waning but powerful stellar processes that fuel them making this T CrB nova particularly exciting.

NASA predicted T CrB nova to appear closer to September. A broader estimation, however, put the sighting to occur anytime this year. The latest news, as per The Guardian , seems to indicate that it could show up anytime between the next few days and weeks.

Once the explosion reaches us, the outburst will be brief, lasting less than a week to the naked eye and visible with binoculars for another week or so.

A brief brilliant blaze: one week

Comparatively, Sirius, the brightest star in the night sky has a magnitude of -1.46, which in astronomy means it burns brighter than stars with positive values. T Coronae Borealis is invisible at a magnitude of +10 but will become visible at +2 making it luster closer to the North Star, Polaris, according to Sky at Night.

As the T CrB nova can occur at any time now, NASA will continue to diffuse news related to the astronomical wonder. It will appear like a crown or semicircle near Boötes and Hercules.

First, Sky at Night BBC suggests locating the Plough star pattern and following the handle to find Boötes that might be described as a kite that triangulates towards two stick legs.

From there, the T Coronae Borealis should be clear. An astronomy app can assist in locating the position. So can binoculars—an ideal prop. 2100 AEST is the best time to view the nuclear explosion according to The Guardian .

Besides its luminosity, the T Coronae Borealis comes with a Greek mythological tale attached related to the legend of Theseus and the minotaur. It represents the crown that Dionysus gave to Ariadne after Theseus abandoned her.

She threw the crown into the sky after her wedding to Dionysus, and the jewels transformed into stars.