NOVA 3000

I drink coffee all day, maybe too much, but I can enjoy a good cup of tea in the evening. Honest-to-goodness tea, real tea, the type that looks like twigs! But with flavor. I’m not talking about those bags in a box, mind you. But I do keep a few around the house for emergencies. We visited a few historic places on a recent vacation to Jamestown, and I picked up a few loose teas. I have a little left and I savor the flavor.

My go-to tea is Earl Gray, a black tea that is very flavorful. A close second is Lady Gray. Lately, I have found that simple ginger tea is a nice way to cap off the night. Take last night, for example.

I was making my wife and me a cup of Lady Gray tea, and we were about to sit down and watch a recorded show when there was a knock at the door. 

“Who on Earth is that?” My wife asked.

“I’ll know as soon as I open the door,” I replied. She gave me that look.

As I opened the door, I saw it was the man from upstairs, on the third floor. We live on the first floor. He had his dog, Bean, with him, and they looked like they just came back from a walk.

He asked, “Oh my God, did you see that?” He paused a heartbeat, “Sorry it’s so late, but I saw your lights on and remembered you talking about this in the parking lot a few months ago and thought you would want to see it.”

I had to ask, “What are you talking about?”

“Something in space exploded, or something, and it is brighter than the Moon.”

“It happened?” I said, “T Coronae Borealis went nova?” 

I started running out the door and realized it was cold. You know, January and all, it is sorta expected. I returned to the house, dressed, and put on a coat in record time. Michael and Bean were still in the breezeway outside my door as I left. They followed close behind me.

I walked up to the main street, where nothing would impede my view north. There it was, a really, really bright star. “WOW!” I said.

“Did it just explode?” Michael asked.

“In a way,” I replied, “But to us, it just exploded. In actuality, this happened 3,000 years ago.”

Michael asked, “Wait. 3,000 years ago?”

“Yep. T Coronae Borealis is 3,000 lightyears away. This means that the light we see from it started 3,000 years ago. One year per lightyear.”

“Oh, I gotcha. Always wondered about that,” Michael said. Bean was content to be outside since it was dry. He is a fair-weather pup, after all. He looked up at the sky and used his professional sniffer to look for something.

We stood on the sidewalk and talked about nothing for a while, staring at the nova that happened 300 centuries ago. As we watched that point in space, others gathered near us, asking what it was. Just about all of them were out walking their dogs one last time before heading to bed.

Someone asked, “Are we about to die?”

“That, my friends, is, or was, the star T Coronae Borealis, in the constellation Corona Borealis, on its southern edge from our view. The explosion we are witnessing happened 3,000 years ago.”

A woman commented, “So, that is 3,000 lightyears away?”

“Yes, it is. This is a once-in-a-lifetime event for most humans,” I felt like this was a teaching moment, like I was teaching the Astronomy Merit Badge to a bunch of Scouts.

I paused, took out my phone, and snapped a few extremely zoomed images. There was little to see, but I had to mark this historical event. February 2, 2025, at around midnight. Thankfully, the night was very dark, not a lot of street lights, and the Moon was not up yet, so there was nothing to take away from the most spectacular celestial event in my personal history. 

We all stood there for a few more minutes, and finally, someone said they were getting cold. Everyone agreed, and we started to walk back to our buildings. Michael and I talked on the walk to where we lived, and Bean thought the stellar phenomenon was not all that impressive. He walked, sniffed, and walked a little more.

We reached the stairs, and Michael picked up Bean. He is a relatively small Pug, and his little legs have one heck of a time on the steps. But he does resemble a dark kidney bean.

Michael said, “Carrying him up the two flights of stairs is much easier and faster than having him walk.”

“No need to explain, I understand.”

“Let me know if you find out about other interesting things in the sky. I find space interesting.”

“Well, as a matter of fact, on February 12 at 6:34 AM, the ISS will pass over our head for about six minutes. It will pass even higher in the sky on February 15 at 5:45 AM, but that is way too early for three minutes of contact opportunity.”

“You gonna go out and watch it fly over?”

“Well, yes, but I hope to talk to the ISS,”

“Talk to them?”

“Yep! I am an amateur radio operator, and I’ll connect a directional antenna I made out of PVC pipe and an old steel tape measure to my handheld radio. If I am fortunate, N1ISS will say hello to me.”

Michael froze on the steps, “That will work?”

I looked him in the eye, “It does work. I have already done it a few times. The ISS has an amateur radio on it, but it also has a repeater. I connected to that repeater, and from here in Raleigh, NC, I talked to someone just east of Tulsa, Oklahoma. It was a short QSO, a communication, but we heard each other.”

“How does he know where you are?”

“When I placed the CQ, the call that he answered, I used my call sign and said FM05, which is our grid square where we are standing, FM05rw, to be more precise.”

“OK then, I’ll see you on the 12th at 0625.”

“Cool. You can video my contact if I am lucky enough to get one.”

He went upstairs, saying sleep well, I replied, goodnight. Walking into the house, I realized my wife had fallen asleep on the chair waiting for me. It was around 1 AM, after all. I restarted the water and set up the tea maker again. No way after that will I get to sleep any time soon.

“How was it?” She asked.

“Cool!” I replied.

The pot beeped, and I made a cup of Earl Gray decaf tea for each of us. There was nothing in it, just tea. We sat and watched an old episode of M*A*S*H before going to bed.

It was a fantastic night!