Is it time to start a Betelgeuse Supernova Watch thread?

In October of 2019 the red supergiant star Betelgeuse (the second-brightest star in Orion, and the 11th-brightest star in the night sky) began dimming markedly, and by the turn of the year it was 2.5 times dimmer than it was four months earlier. Then in mid January, a burst of gravity waves was detected from that region of the sky. Just now (January 22nd 2020) it again dimmed sharply, to a point that it is much dimmer than at any time in recorded history.

Is Betelgeuse about to explode?

Hard to say; it's a rather odd star. It spins much faster than theory would predict, and has anomalous amounts of Nitrogen in its photosphere. It is catalogued as alpha-Orionis despite being noticeably dimmer (even at its brightest) than Rigel... raising the possibility that it was much brighter hundreds (or thousands) of years ago.

Even its evolutionary stage is a matter of some debate. It has long been thought to be an evolved red supergiant, nearing the end of its life. But a different theory has been gaining traction lately... the possibility that Betelgeuse might be a hybrid star formed fairly recently by the merger of two binary components. This would neatly explain two of the major anomalies: the rapid spin and the unexpected presence of Nitrogen at its surface.

Orion's belt is the pot, right?

that's kind of the constellation most kiwis would know for sure

what are the chances that a star in our near sky were about to explode, that would be amazing

what a drama star

Betelgeuse is Orion's left shoulder. Bellatrix is his right shoulder. Alnitak, Alnilam and Mintaka (from left to right) make up his belt. The Great Nebula is his sword, hanging from his belt. Saiph is his left knee, and Rigel (the brightest star in Orion) is his right knee.

I think the Betelgeuse is the very bright one on the right? (was the very bright one on the right)

The red one at bottom left.

Oh wow, right on, so that is his sword over there...

Yes, the sword (hanging from his belt) is actually the Great Nebula in Orion.

if we say the name three times does the star explode?

lol

What will happen if it explodes? Will it greatly effect humanity as we know it?

well, if it already has exploded, effects on earth should be seen in about 642 million light years. mark your calendar!

Maybe it's the Death Star... 

If we send Woollensock there in a spaceship, we will find out the truth in a few hundred million light years...

Maybe...

It's about 650 light years away, and the "Kill radius" for a typical type-2 supernova is about 50 light years. So we will only receive about 0.7% (seven tenths of one percent) of the lethal dose of radiation.

That's not a lot more than you get from a banana.

(Bananas contain Potassium, which has a natural radioactive isotope K-40)

um sorry to go off piste a bit but - do you mention bananas because of the radiation they get to kill the banana spiders?

No.

All bananas naturally contain Potassium.

All Potassium naturally contains the isotope Potassium-40 (a bit more than 1/100th of 1%).

Potassium-40 is radioactive. It decays to Calcium-40 via beta decay, or (more rarely) to Argon-40 via K-capture.

This minor radioactivity of bananas is entirely natural and unavoidable.

Quite a few common things are mildly radioactive. Concrete, for example. Or people.

The Potassium in an average human body produces 4300 radioactive disintegrations per second.

Hm!

That's very interesting. However I have heard that all cavendish bananas are given radiation treatment before export - those 'nana spiders are super large and gnarly.

Cavendish, surely you're not referring to Henry Cavendish? It's an experiment that flat earth's exploit, although I don't know why they exploit, because the Cavendish experiment itself has not much relation to the nature of their idiocy and they should just get on with their ridiculous anti conic sections regime and deem the Earth to be hyperbolic. Sorted. If the gravitational constant varies with time, then Cavendish experiment determines the variation of time, making bananas straddled between the two seemingly disparate worlds.

So according to a very literal interpretation of being what you eat, if you were to devour a banana, the atomic nuclei inside of you would gradually reach tip top instability, and there would be a nuclear fusion battle dancing about. Watch out, spheromak designers. Mind you, if you have a friend called Sfero Mak or Toka Mak, beware.