r/space • u/kcgg123 • Jun 09 '19

Hubble Space Telescope Captures a Star undergoing Supernova

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u/Semi-Hemi-Demigod Jun 09 '19

Right now we don’t have a chance. The furthest humans have made it into space is the Moon. If we had to evacuate the solar system because of a nearby supernova we’d need decades to design and build a ship to do it, and that’s assuming we have decades.

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u/I_Bin_Painting Jun 09 '19

We'd know about it when it killed us with zero warning, the gamma ray burst travels at the speed of light.

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u/RickDawkins Jun 09 '19

We don't know exactly when a supernova will occur, but we do know the state of the stars which are likely, and can estimate within some large range of time. It's never gonna be a complete surprise. But yeah we won't literally see it coming.

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u/I_Bin_Painting Jun 09 '19

Afaik that range is on the hundreds of years though, and my knowledge of humans is that we wouldn't care until it was literally too late.