Two Suns by 2012(maybe)

Explosion will create "new sun"

May be set for 2012 appearance
IT'S the ultimate experience for Star Wars fans - staring forlornly off into the distance as twin suns sink into the horizon.
Yet it's not just a figment of George Lucas's imagination - twin suns are real. And here's the big news - they could be coming to Earth.

Yes, any day now we see a second sun light up the sky, if only for a matter of weeks.

The infamous red super-giant star in Orion’s nebula - Betelgeuse - is predicted to go gangbusters and the impending super-nova may reach Earth before 2012, and when it does, all of our wildest Star Wars dreams will come true.

The second biggest star in the universe is losing mass, a typical indication that a gravitation collapse is occurring.

When that happens, we'll get our second sun, according to Dr Brad Carter, Senior Lecturer of Physics at the University of Southern Queensland.


“This fuel keeps Betelgeuse shining and supported. When this fuel runs out the star will literally collapse in upon itself and it will do so very quickly.”

When this happens a giant explosion will occur, tens of millions of times brighter than the sun.

The bad news is, it could also happen in a million years. But who's counting?

The important thing is, one day, night will become day for several weeks on Earth.

“This is the final hurrah for the star,” says Dr Carter.

“It goes bang, it explodes, it lights up - we’ll have incredible brightness for a brief period of time for a couple of weeks and then over the coming months it begins to fade and then eventually it will be very hard to see at all.”

The interwebs is being flooded with doomsday theories saying the impending supernova confirms the Mayan calendar’s prediction of the Armageddon in 2012.

These conspiracies aren’t helped by the word “Betelgeuse” being associated with the devil.

Though it is a derivation of the Arabic phrase “yad Al Jauza” meaning the “hand of Al-Jauza” referring to a mysterious woman that controls the order of the universe, it hasn’t stopped some people from clearing out their bunkers and stocking up on tinned food.

Far from being a sign of the apocalypse, according to Dr Carter the supernova will provide Earth with elements necessary for survival and continuity.

“When a star goes bang, the first we will observe of it is a rain of tiny particles called nuetrinos,” says Dr Carter.

“They will flood through the Earth and bizarrely enough, even though the supernova we see visually will light up the night sky, 99 per cent of the energy in the supernova is released in these particles that will come through our bodies and through the Earth with absolutely no harm whatsoever.”

Stars such as the supernova produce elements that are critical to life on Earth.

Quite literally, the whole of Earth and our solar system is made of star stuff, including most of the heavy elements of the Periodic Table.

“It literally makes things like gold, silver - all the heavy elements - even things like uranium….a star like Betelgeuse is instantly forming for us all sorts of heavy elements and atoms that our own Earth and our own bodies have from long past supernovi,” Dr carter said.

Some experts have speculated Betelgeuse’s explosion may cause a neutron star or result in the formation of a black hole approximately 1300 light years from Earth, but Dr Carter says it could go either way.

“There’s a reasonably even chance of a neutron star or a black hole”, he says.

“If it were me, I’d suspect it would more likely become a black hole at 20 solar masses



www.news.com.au...

reply to post by alchemist2012

News mimics Conspiracy Theories?

I'll add more when I read this.


Um yikes. Interesting though I hope it doesn't happen. The article is very light hearted even when the scientist suggests that this could possibly create a black hole.
Funny I heard this mentioned in the Aoi36.. prediction thread. Guess they want to have a way of keeping the chaos down.

Not sure about this theory, but Jupiter is made from the same stuff the sun is. And all it takes is one reaction, and jupiter will turn ablaze.

reply to post by alchemist2012


Cool post, and Betelgeuse's supernova explosion will be something to look forward to seeing, possibly in my lifetime...I love learning and reading about the universe

reply to post by alchemist2012


Interesting spin on the 2012 angle.

S&F

I'll have to investigate this further, but I highly doubt we'll see this happen in our lifetime.

~Namaste

reply to post by SonOfTheLawOfOne


Yeah i'm sure they really dont knowwhen its going boom..Just an estimate i guess but lets wait and see

Can some one fix the link i cant get it to work for me

They will flood through the Earth and bizarrely enough, even though the supernova we see visually will light up the night sky, 99 per cent of the energy in the supernova is released in these particles that will come through our bodies and through the Earth with absolutely no harm whatsoever.”

WHAT?!?!?!?!?!?!
did anyone else find that a little weird?
no harm?

beetlejuice beetlejuice beetlejuice!
there i said it.

This is quite interesting, I have read a lot about Betelgeuse, and if this supernova does occur in 2012 or in our lifetime, I would love to see it shine in the night sky. I have never seen a supernova shine in sky before, with the naked eye. It could be the same as the 1054 Crab supernova explosion - that was, apparently, visible to the naked eye for around 2 years
Well, apart from this, lets just see what will happen.

Originally posted by questcequecest
They will flood through the Earth and bizarrely enough, even though the supernova we see visually will light up the night sky, 99 per cent of the energy in the supernova is released in these particles that will come through our bodies and through the Earth with absolutely no harm whatsoever.”

WHAT?!?!?!?!?!?!
did anyone else find that a little weird?
no harm?

beetlejuice beetlejuice beetlejuice!
there i said it.

edit on 18-1-2011 by questcequecest because: (no reason given)

I found it extremely odd

reply to post by Anttyk47


Jupiter doesn't have the mass to sustain nuclear fusion.

Or we'll all burn from too much heat
Any one smell double global warming?

Originally posted by alchemist2012

Originally posted by questcequecest
They will flood through the Earth and bizarrely enough, even though the supernova we see visually will light up the night sky, 99 per cent of the energy in the supernova is released in these particles that will come through our bodies and through the Earth with absolutely no harm whatsoever.”

WHAT?!?!?!?!?!?!
did anyone else find that a little weird?
no harm?

beetlejuice beetlejuice beetlejuice!
there i said it.

edit on 18-1-2011 by questcequecest because: (no reason given)

I found it extremely odd

No: nuetrinos come zipping through all thtime and they don't interact they are
extremely hard to detect..

What is a neutrino?

Scientists represent neutrinos with the Greek letter nu, or v.

Neutrinos are among the most abundant particles in the universe, a billion times more abundant than the particles that make up stars, planets and people. Unimaginably large numbers of neutrinos from the first moments of the universe are still present today.

Though a trillion naturally occurring neutrinos from the sun and other bodies in the galaxy pass through us each second, they interact so rarely with other particles that they are very difficult to detect. That is why researchers strive to create intense beams packed with as many neutrinos as they can produce and to build large, precise detectors that can spot them when they interact.

Neutrinos have no electric charge and come in three kinds, or “flavors,” as scientists call them. They have a mass, but the heaviest neutrino is nearly a million times lighter than the lightest charged particle.

www-nova.fnal.gov...

Ok so the Doc is saying that neutrino particles will have no effect on anything in particular, so we have nothing to be afraid of. But what about gamma rays that are released during supernovas? could months of daylight really be considered good for any life form other than plants? Think how messed up your internal clock would get. Then think in respect to the wildlife on a global scale. If theres no threat of radiation, then this might be a spectacular event.


Also, a supernova coupled with an overactive Sun? hm...

Originally posted by asperetty
Ok so the Doc is saying that neutrino particles will have no effect on anything in particular, so we have nothing to be afraid of. But what about gamma rays that are released during supernovas? could months of daylight really be considered good for any life form other than plants? Think how messed up your internal clock would get. Then think in respect to the wildlife on a global scale. If theres no threat of radiation, then this might be a spectacular event.


Also, a supernova coupled with an overactive Sun? hm...

edit on 18-1-2011 by asperetty because: (no reason given)

www.universetoday.com...

Fortunately, because we are not looking directly down on its pole, when Betelgeuse does go bang, we won’t be fried by a gamma ray burst (GRB) which may occur (while a core collapse supernova can cause one kind of GRB, it is not yet known if all such supernovae produce GRBs; in any case, such a GRB is one of a pair of jets which rip through the poles of the dying star).

earthsky.org...

Betelgeuse will brighten enormously for a few weeks or months, perhaps as bright as the full moon and visible in broad daylight. Fortunately for us, it appears that there will be little if any adverse affects to Earth.

Would it look something like that episode of Futurama? At the end of the valentines day episode with the candy hearts, they explode in a similar fashion and make a purple spiral-looking galaxy-like thing in the sky. Obviously it wouldn't be a galaxy, and it would be much smaller in relation to the size of the object in futurama...but it'd still be neat.


Posted Via ATS Mobile: m.abovetopsecret.com

Originally posted by Anttyk47
Not sure about this theory, but Jupiter is made from the same stuff the sun is. And all it takes is one reaction, and jupiter will turn ablaze.

This is incorrect. Jupiter does not have anywhere near the mass needed for it to become a star, despite what 2001: A Space Odyssey would have you believe.

reply to post by Pauligirl



According to the OP's quote, the burst will cause night be as bright as day for several weeks, and then take months to die down. Thanks for clarifying the gamma rays.

Just for ref: Dr Carter -“It goes bang, it explodes, it lights up - we’ll have incredible brightness for a brief period of time for a couple of weeks and then over the coming months it begins to fade and then eventually it will be very hard to see at all."

reply to post by alchemist2012


Well it would be a site to see wouldn't it? Imo, it won't happen for a while, but who knows now a days. This world is so unbelievably unpredictable more than ever now. Anyone is to say what could happen.

reply to post by 46ACE


at the same rate as a mass explosion coming from the 2nd biggest star in our solar system?!?!?!
have we ever experienced that before?
do you know the normal ration in which we have these things going thru us?


cmon mate.