"We could see it go supernova anywhere from tomorrow to 500,000 years from now," astronomer Grant Hill told Forbes.
Why should you be scared ?
Accept the fact that we are living on a planet which is in constant danger from outer space, and also from within.
But ....
The chance of anything drastic happening from outer space is so remote that you can basically forget about this completely, and just continue to live your life.
Even if this star becomes a supernova, it's poles must be directly in line with our solar system, to the millionth part of a degree, for any danger to come our way.
The possibility of that occurring is practically nil !
And besides, things don't change that fast in space. This star could take hundreds of millions of years to actually become a supernova, and not even your bones will survive that long.
It is also possible that this star has already become a supernova, many centuries ago.
Just remember that we are seeing it as it was, 8000 years ago, because that is how long the light takes to get to us !
Supernovas are just one of many dangers from outer space, but luckily these affect us so infrequently we can basically forget them. In any case we can do absolutely nothing against such incredibly powerful things, which make our atom bombs seem like pea-shooters.
In the meantime, you should worry more about Yellowstone park, or other super volcanoes on our planet, because these present a much larger danger, and which explode much more often.
By which I mean every couple of hundred thousand years or so !
An even greater threat to you is from viruses, which we have been at war with since life began. These mutate at an incredible pace and it is only a matter of time before the next worldwide epidemic decimates our population. The ease of international travel and world trade makes this process even easier for these viruses to spread.
Nobody has promised you a totally safe planet to live on, and accepting this fact is a part of life itself !
That is why you should live your life to the full !
Just remember that things can change at the blink of an eye, and nothing will be like it was.
If we see this thing go off, the gamma ray burst would arrive at the same time.
You have every reason to be concerned.
hopefully, thousands of years from now. live your life as fully as you can.
A long, long, long, long, long, long way
I just heard about WR-104, a star about to go super or hyper nova, and it's 8000 light years away. How long would it take for it to get to earth?
