{"id":228208,"date":"2025-07-01T03:02:15","date_gmt":"2025-07-01T03:02:15","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/228208\/"},"modified":"2025-07-01T03:02:15","modified_gmt":"2025-07-01T03:02:15","slug":"another-nova-a-2nd-new-star-is-now-visible-in-vela","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/228208\/","title":{"rendered":"Another nova \u2013 a 2nd \u2018new star\u2019 \u2013 is now visible in Vela"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"AView at EarthSky Community Photos<\/a>. | Eliot Herman<\/a> captured this image from Chile on June 27, 2025, and wrote: \u201cAnother bright nova in June 2025. That\u2019s 2, after a long drought. This one (Nova Vela 0572) is very far south so I imaged it with a remote telescope. This was captured about a day-and-a-half after its discovery. And it\u2019s now blue. It\u2019ll be interesting to follow as it reddens in the coming weeks.\u201d Thank you, Eliot!
\nAnd now there are 2 novas visible in the sky!<\/p>\n

Earlier this month, we reported<\/a> a \u2018new star\u2019 \u2013 or nova<\/a> \u2013 visible to the eye in the constellation Lupus. But, in what\u2019s likely a once-in-a-lifetime event, southern observers can now witness two novas simultaneously visible to the unaided eye.<\/p>\n

The 2nd \u2018new star\u2019 or nova in the constellation Vela<\/a> is called V572 Velorum,. It\u2019s visible to the unaided eye from Earth\u2019s Southern Hemisphere (the earlier nova, V462 Lupi<\/a>, is visible from most of Earth). <\/p>\n

John Seach and Andrew Pearce discovered the 2nd nova on June 25. At discovery, it was shining at magnitude +5.7<\/a>! That\u2019s faint, but it\u2019s within the limit for viewing with the unaided eye. Recent observations<\/a> indicate it is currently shining even more brightly than at its discovery, at a magnitude of +5.5. <\/p>\n

Previously, V462 Lupi<\/a> had burst into view on June 12. That first nova is currently shining around +5.9<\/a> magnitude, barely within the limit for viewing with the unaided eye. Still, from a dark sky location, it might be possible to glimpse both V462 Lupi and V572 Velorum from Earth\u2019s Southern Hemisphere. It\u2019s a rare treat to witness a single nova. But the occurrence of two novae simultaneously is super rare! <\/p>\n

Finder chart for the nova
\n\"V572The location of nova V572 Velorum is location marked in constellation Vela. Image via Wikipedia<\/a>. CC BY 4.0<\/a>.
\nSeeing 2 novae at once?<\/p>\n

Astronomer Stephen James O\u2019Meara<\/a>, who lives in Africa and who has observed both novas, told EarthSky: <\/p>\n

\n

I am still looking at databases, (to see if this happened before) but the first instance I have found occurred ~17 years ago in 2018. AAVSO light curves show that FM Circini (Nova Circinis 2018<\/a>) reached a peak brightness of magnitude 5.8 on March 22, 2018, and on that same day, Nova V906 Carinae<\/a> peaked at around magnitude 5.9. So the two novae shared a similar naked-eye magnitude albeit briefly. Once again, these were Southern Hemisphere novae. So these are rare events.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

Images of the novae
\n\"StarryHere\u2019s an image showing Nova Velorum on June 28, 2025. The nova is identified and stars of comparable magnitudes are noted as well. Image via Stephen O\u2019Meara<\/a>. Used with permission.
\n\"CompositeHere\u2019s a composite image showing both novae on the same night, June 26, 2025. Image via Stephen O\u2019Meara<\/a>. Used with permission.<\/p>\n

Did you catch a picture of the nova? Submit it here<\/a>.<\/p>\n

How a nova occurs
\n\"IllustrationA nova always involves 2 closely-orbiting stars. One is a tiny, dense white dwarf about the size of the Earth. And the companion star may be similar in mass to our sun. The white dwarf\u2019s powerful gravity siphons material (mostly hydrogen) away from its companion, over a timespan of thousands of years. The hot gas forms a disk around the dwarf, which funnels the material down to the star\u2019s surface. In time, the pilfered gas is compacted and heated until it ignites in a massive thermonuclear blast a million times brighter than the light of both stars combined. To our eyes the explosion looks like a brand new star in the night sky. Previously, the pair was there for a long, long time, but too faint to call attention to itself. Good news. The dwarf typically survives the blast and begins anew to gather more hydrogen for the next eruption. When you know what\u2019s behind that single pinpoint of light, it\u2019s a marvel! Chart via Astro Bob<\/a>. Used with permission.<\/p>\n

Bottom line: A \u2018new star\u2019, or a nova, was discovered in Vela on June 25, 2025. It\u2019s bright enough to see with the eye! So you can see two novae at once if you are in the Southern Hemisphere.<\/p>\n

Marcy Curran
\n View Articles<\/a><\/p>\n

About the Author:<\/p>\n

Meet Marcy Curran, our voice of the night sky on EarthSky YouTube. Check out her popular short videos in the Sky category on our YouTube channel. When she’s not making videos, Marcy is an EarthSky editor, helping to keep our night sky guide up-to-date and just generally helping to keep the wheels turning around here. Marcy has enjoyed stargazing since she was a child, going on family camping trips under the dark skies of Wyoming. She bought her first telescope in time to see Halley\u2019s Comet when it visited the inner solar system in 1986. She co-founded her local astronomy club and remains an active board member. Marcy taught astronomy at her local community college for over 20 years. She and her husband live in Wyoming, in a rural location, with an all-sky camera and super-good horizon views! And, their observatory will soon be ready to photograph the night sky.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"View at EarthSky Community Photos. | Eliot Herman captured this image from Chile on June 27, 2025, and…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":228209,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3844],"tags":[70,413,21423,16,15],"class_list":{"0":"post-228208","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-space","8":"tag-science","9":"tag-space","10":"tag-tonight","11":"tag-uk","12":"tag-united-kingdom"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@uk\/114775755776704416","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/228208","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=228208"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/228208\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/228209"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=228208"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=228208"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=228208"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}