Geminids and Betelgeuse

Took some 200 photos in clear skies around midnight but only captured one Geminid...



of course the bright moon parked in the middle of Gemini was no help... reports from America suggest the rates may have picked up in the early hours. 

What was interesting however was the faintness of Betelgeuse, now at its dimmest in more than 50 years. The difference in comparison with Rigel from previous years was obvious with the naked eye, and indeed it seemed almost more comparable with Bellatrix to the right. A recent official measurement put it at mag 1.12



Clear skies,
Finbarr.

That is most interesting about Betelgeuse, Finbarr.
So it was as faint as this some 50 years ago.
Of course some people will think it is about to go supernova.
But maybe it won't!
That's why we must keep an eye on it over the coming months.

I'm glad you saw 1 Geminid.
On Friday night 6th December I saw 2 and I was not looking for any.

Clear skies,

Aubrey.

Yes I noticed Betelgeuse last night when I got home from work close to midnight. Of course it was bathed in moonlight but by comparison with Rigel and Bellatrix I estimated it at between 1.0 and 1.2. In recent years I've rated it much closer to Rigel. Does anyone know if dimming is a precursor of going Supernova? I guess the empirical evidence is a bit thin on the ground

I was just going to mention that Paul; I don't suppose there is anything in the textbook to help us prepare for a Supernova! I'd imagine there would more erratic spells of variability but who knows, maybe it will just detonate at a moment's notice. I'm not sure if it was equally faint 50 years ago Aubrey, I think this was the time span of measurements available to those particular researchers -

www.astronomerstelegram.org/?read=13341

Finbarr.

I noticed that Betelgeuse seemed markedly dimmer on Xmas Eve

Here is a very interesting and informative article about this subject

www.forbes.com/sites/startswithabang/201...OnQnAY4#62cfb66647bf

I talked a bit about Betelgeuse in my warmup talk to the IAA last Wednesday. You can see it here...