Cosmos: A Spacetime Odyssey

Eighth Episode:
Sisters of the Sun: The psychedelic death shrouds of ordinary stars are fleeting, lasting only tens of thousands of years. . . . The stars in a binary star system . . . [like] Sirius [and its companion] white dwarf [will create numerous novae as the system ages]. . . . A star about 15 times as massive as the Sun - one like Rigel - [will ignite] a more powerful nuclear reaction, a supernova [which will result in a pulsar]. . . . [F]or a star more than 30 times as massive as the Sun - a star like Alnilam, in Orion's Belt - [its supernova will create] a black hole. . . . [Finally, when a supermassive star like the largest in the Eta Carinae system] goes, it won't become a mere nova or supernova. It will become something far more catastrophic - a hypernova. And it could happen in our lifetime. . . . Earth will be just fine. . . . But still, Eta Carinae in its death throes will . . . light up the night of the southern hemisphere with the brightness of a second Moon.