The star Betelgeuse going supernova soon?

[stevenb]

I NEED to find out if this is true.

Seriously though, all you need to do is wait and see. In a few weeks you'll know. Before that, nobody can possibly know for sure. I'd love to live to see it, but I don't think the odds are in my favor.

Out of curiosity, why the NEED to find out?

 

[Antiphon]

I think it will be seen to go nova on December 21, 2012. It will form a rotating black hole with a pulsating torch beam and incinerate the earth.

Perhaps you should consider selling me your house at a steep discount. What with the world ending and all it would be the prudent move.

 

[Unix Ronin]

I saw something that said it could happen within a few weeks?

source
http://unixronin.livejournal.com/763082.html

can someone verify this?

Well, it still technically COULD. But there's now at least reasonably reliable refutation (alliteration über alles!) of the original, dubious and unverified, report on which all the speculation was based, http://http://blogs.discovermagazine.com/badastronomy/2010/06/01/is-betelgeuse-about-to-blow/" . As was highly probable right from the start, it's just an unverified rumor based on a misunderstanding of already known data. There is no dramatic new observation.

Astronomers have been saying for years that Betelgeuse could easily go at any time within the next thousand years or so, but based on that article, there's no actual direct evidence that it's fixing to do so Right Now. Which is kind of a shame; in addition to being a truly spectacular show, it would have given us huge amounts of data on how a Type II supernova actually happens.

But ... no BOOM! today. Nor probably tomorrow. Maybe next year, or two or three hundred years from now.

"Where is my Betelgeuse-shattering KABOOM? There was supposed to be a Betelgeuse-shattering KABOOM!"

 

[brother time]

Betelgeuse is towards the end of it's life. However the big Kaboom could be in several thousand years as it usually is with stars. It would be cool to watch but unlikely for us to see it. :(
BT

 

[Chewy0087]

The challenge now becomes to try to keep this thread alive until it actually does go supernova! (as in, we see it go supernova).

 

[soulfien]

So the really lucky folks (for whom Betelgeuse is only visible at night) will get 24 hour days, everybody else will get at least some time with two suns in the sky. The extra hour of light from daylight savings time won't burn the crops, but this might. Probably, all we'll get is visible light (not gamma rays or X-rays), so it shouldn't be an ELE. It's sure going to freak everyone out, though...

Daylight Savings does nothing to add or remove sunlight from crops. Simply offsetting our house clocks doesn't alter the course of the sun.