Betelgeuse - Just say it three times!

[nomadrush]

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-1349383/Betelgeuse-second-sun-Earth-supernova-turns-night-day.html

Apparently, scientists are predicting that the Earth will get a "second sun" during an extroadinary occurence which may happen within the next year.

The giant star Betelgeuse is due to blow itself into oblivion according to the news story

Comments

[major_clanger]

From that article:

Brad Carter, Senior Lecturer of Physics at the University of Southern Queensland in Australia, claimed yesterday that the galactic blast could happen before 2012 - or any time over the next million years.

Which (as someone with a lifelong interest in astronomy) is hardly news; we've had a pretty good understanding of stellar evolution since the 1960s, including the knowledge that red supergiant stars such as Betelgeuse end their lives by exploding as a supernova. I'm pretty sure I recall reading about how Betelgeuse will be a spectacular sight when it goes off back when I was young. The thing is, it's very hard to judge how close a star in that state is to dying and so, as Carter says, it could happen any time.

I rather suspect this is all tied to 2012 hype, and a whole load of other natural disasters and spectacles that we know will happen, but not when, will soon be touted as 'could happen in 2012!' (with a tiny footnote to say 'or any other time, really, but that wouldn't be newsworthy...')

2012

[nomadrush]

It does seem that the simple mention of "2012" does give it far more publicity value:)