Earth 'to get second sun' as supernova turns night into day
By David Gardner UPDATED: 15:12 EST, 10 March 2011
The Earth could soon have a second sun, at least for a week or two.
The cosmic phenomenon will happen when one of the brightest stars in the night sky explodes into a supernova.
And, according to a report yesterday, the most stunning light show in the planet’s history could happen as soon as this year.
Cosmic phenomenon: The Earth could soon see two suns - just like Luke Skywalker saw on
Tatooine in the Star Wars film (pictured above)
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Two Suns?
Twin Stars Could Be Visible From Earth By 2012
The Huffington Post Dean Praetorius
First Posted: 01/20/11 05:33 PM ET Updated: 05/25/11 07:25 PM ET
Earth could be getting a second sun, at least temporarily.
Dr. Brad Carter, Senior Lecturer of Physics at the University of Southern Queensland, outlined the scenario to news.com.au. Betelgeuse, one of the night sky's brightest stars, is losing mass, indicating it is collapsing. It could run out of fuel and go super-nova at any time.
When that happens, for at least a few weeks, we'd see a second sun, Carter says. There may also be no night during that timeframe.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/01/20/two-suns-twin-stars_n_811864.html
Planets With Two Suns Found
Charles Q. Choi First Posted: 01/12/12 11:10 AM ET Updated: 01/12/12 11:10 AM ET
Astronomers have found more real-life versions of Luke Skywalker's home planet Tatooine from "Star Wars" — alien worlds that see two suns rise and set each day instead of one. And these two newfound worlds are also extremely close to the habitable zones of their parent stars, scientists say.
The discovery cements what appears to be a new class of twin sun alien planets and may help astronomers estimate how many of such binary stars possess planets. The finding also suggests that many planets might lie in the habitable zones of such systems, researchers said.
Astronomers used NASA's Kepler space telescope to identify the two so-called "circumbinary planets" amid 750 systems they sampled. Their discovery brings the total number of confirmed double-sun worlds up to three.
Two worlds, four suns
Both newfound twin-sun planets are low-density gas giants located around distant star pairs. [Gallery: "Tatooine" Planets With 2 Suns Found]
The first, called Kepler-34 b, is about 22 percent of the mass of Jupiter (the largest gas giant in our solar system) and 76 percent the width of Jupiter. Kepler-34 b orbits two sunlike stars once every 289 days at about the same distance as Earth is from the sun. The planet is located about 4,900 light-years from Earth.
The second planet, called Kepler-35 b, orbits two stars that are 5,400 light-years from Earth. It has about 13 percent the mass of Jupiter and is 73 percent as wide. It and orbits its parent stars, which are slightly smaller than the sun, once every 131 days from a distance about 60 percent that between Earth and our sun.
These orbits place these planets very near the habitable zones of these stars — that is to say, it is neither too hot nor too cold for liquid water to form on a planet's surface in these regions, meaning that life as we know it could in principle gain a foothold there.
"With only three circumbinary planets known, we are already very close to that special 'Goldilocks' zone," study lead author William Welsh, an astronomer at San Diego State University, told SPACE.com "It is my opinion that circumbinary planets in the habitable zone will turn out to be fairly common, and that is exciting."
The scientists presented their research today (Jan. 11) at the 219th American Astronomical Society meeting in Austin, Texas and detailed their findings in this week's online edition of the journal Nature. In a separate study, also appearing in Nature and at the AAS meeting today, astronomers unveiled a new analysis that suggests our Milky Way galaxy is home to at least 160 billion alien planets.
Real-life "Tatooine" planets
Most sunlike stars in our galaxy are found in pairs known as binary systems. Scientists discovered the first planet orbiting a binary star system last year using theKepler space observatory. That circumbinary planet, Kepler-16 b, is located about 200 light-years away.
All the circumbinary planets seen to date are very close to the critical distance when their orbits would be unstable. "If they were only 20 to 25 percent closer to their stars, the gravitational tugs of the two stars would build up over time and eventually make the planet's orbit so wild that the planet would be ejected into deep space," Welsh said.
Given the rate of circumbinary planets seen to date, the scientists estimate about 1 percent of closely linked binary stars have giant planets circling around them. This suggests our galaxy is home to at least several million circumbinary planets.
"There are lots of these circumbinary planets — they are not the rare beasts that they might have been," Welsh said. "That tells us that nature likes to form planets, even in chaotic environments close to two stars."
"I am going to stay focused on the hunt for more circumbinary planets," Welsh added. "It's by no means easy, but I expect we will find more of these gems in the Kepler data." _______________________________________________________________________________________
NEWS ALERT —
Will We Be Seeing TWO SUNS from Planet Earth?
September 17, 2012
TWO SUNS Visible From Planet Earth
…. Shining Down on You
Well we do know that Planets in our galaxy can have more that one Moon, but can you imagine observing two suns when looking into the sky.
Yes there are many changes happening in our galaxy, many planetary alignments which actually shift the electromagnetic forces which hit our planet and also cause our earth to shift causing earth quakes, volcanic eruptions along with the shifting of the poles, if you have been following this.
Life as we know it is shifting and we need to realize that we live in a very dynamic, always changing solar system. AS part of following the planet and stars shifting I came across this article on 2 Suns From Planet Earth. It seems that Betelgeuse one of the night sky’s brightest stars, is losing mass, indicating it is collapsing. When this happens the star runs out of fuel and goes super-nova.
What we could very possibly see from OUR Home, planet earth for at least a few weeks, would be a second sun.
Two Suns? Twin Stars Could Be Visible From Earth By 2012
Dr. Brad Carter, Senior Lecturer of Physics at the University of Southern Queensland, outlined the scenario to news.com.au. Betelgeuse, one of the night sky’s brightest stars, is losing mass, indicating it is collapsing. It could run out of fuel and go super-nova at any time. When that happens, for at least a few weeks, we’d see a second sun, Carter says. There may also be no night during that timeframe.
The Star Wars-esque scenario could happen by 2012, Carter says… or it could take longer. The explosion could also cause a neutron star or result in the formation of a black hole 1300 light years from Earth, reports news.com.au. But doomsday sayers should be careful about speculation on this one. If the star does go super-nova, Earth will be showered with harmless particles, according to 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,” he told news.com.au.
In fact, a neutrino shower could be beneficial to Earth. According to Carter this “star stuff” makes up the universe. “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,” said Carter.
UPDATE: To clarify, the news.com.au article does not say a neutrino shower could be beneficial to Earth, but implies a supernova could be beneficial, stating, “Far from being a sign of the apocalypse, according to Dr Carter the supernova will provide Earth with elements necessary for survival and continuity.”
UPDATE II: In a follow-up piece on news.com.au, Dr. Carter stressed that there is no way of knowing when the star may go supernova. U.S. astronomer Phil Plait added, “Betelgeuse might go up tonight, or it might not be for 100,000 years. We’re just not sure.”
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Two Suns in the Sky by Stuart Wilde - July 30, 2012
"Two Suns High in the East, Snake Bite's Coma Berenice..." Song of the Innocents
I was watching the sun set behind some hills, there were trees between the hills and where I was standing, so the sunlight was diffused as it passed through the branches and leaves.
I saw what looked like a second sun above the normal sun. It was a disk smaller than the sun but very clear to see.
I asked Khris Krepcik (www.thehoodedsage.com) if he could see it and he said he could. We watched the second sun for quite a few minutes. Then the light changed and we couldn’t see the second sun in the glare.
In 1999 I wrote the lyrics of a song sung by children called, “The Song of the Innocence”, Larry Hogan and David Lord did the music. The children sing of a pole shift saying,
“Two suns high in the East, Snake bites Coma Berenice.”
The reference to the snake and Coma Berenice is a way of saying the stars have changed positions.
People say planet X (Nibiru) is approaching I reckon it is here. The Eskimos say the Arctic sun has moved position. Meanwhile in 2011 I saw visions of high waters every few days for a year. A week or so ago the high water visions came back. If the poles shift the seas would rise and the rivers would flood. Stuart Wilde
Read more about the constellation, Coma Berenices, which refers to a classical story concerning the hair of Berenice II, the wife of Ptolemy Soter III of Egypt.
© 2012 — Stuart Wilde.
www.stuartwilde.com — All rights reserved.
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Planet Orbiting Two Suns
Credit: NASA/JPL-CaltechThis artist's concept illustrates Kepler-16b, the first planet known to definitively orbit two stars -- a real-life Tatooine, from 'Star Wars.' The planet, which can be seen in the foreground, was discovered by NASA's Kepler mission.
More images of SUNS here
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And now I share with you a few of the many pictures that have been taken of the sky in the Kona-Captain Cook-Kealakekua area of the Big Island. These have not been altered in any way. In some expamples I have shown some photos taken one right after another to document the second sun or unknown celestial object as it moves.
- Joan Ocean, 5/11/2013
Photos I have from here in Kealakekua of similar images of two objects in sky.
 
 
 
This final photo was taken while aboard our cruise ship moored in the sea with Humpback Whales. This blue light has no explanation.
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