{"id":63886,"date":"2024-09-20T10:10:45","date_gmt":"2024-09-20T10:10:45","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/df362d44-2a4d-4b1a-a2bd-6c58761d7f3f"},"modified":"2024-09-20T10:39:42","modified_gmt":"2024-09-20T10:39:42","slug":"hamal-an-utterly-normal-star-in-aries-that-proves-that-being-average-can-be-interesting","status":"publish","type":"rss_feed","link":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/bbcskyatnight\/rss_feed\/hamal-an-utterly-normal-star-in-aries-that-proves-that-being-average-can-be-interesting\/","title":{"rendered":"Hamal, an utterly normal star in Aries that proves that being average can be interesting"},"content":{"rendered":"

<\/p>

By Pete Lawrence\n <\/p>

Published: Friday, 20 September 2024 at 10:10 AM<\/p>

\n\n

Hamal is a bright star shining away at mag. +2.0, located in the constellation Aries.<\/p>

The name Hamal means \u2018the lamb\u2019 and it\u2019s the brightest star in Aries, as well as being the 50th brightest star in the sky<\/a>.<\/p>

Aries is often described as looking like a bent line. Although this does the much larger form of the celestial ram a great injustice, it does provide a convenient method of identifying Hamal (Alpha (\u03b1) Arietis), the star marking the eastern end of the \u2018bent line\u2019.\u00a0<\/p>

It lies at the relatively close distance of 65.8 lightyears<\/a> from Earth and is believed to play host to a large orbiting exoplanet<\/a>, 1.8x more massive than Jupiter and orbiting its primary every 381 days.<\/p>