Sirius and the Eastern Sky over Kaituna Valley

Emergency Blip time again tonight, and this time I went for a wander in the warm night air to grab this shot loooking East.

The bright star right of centre is Sirius, the brightest star in the night sky. To the left, Rigel sits above the belt of Orion, the Hunter (keen Northern hemisphere viewers will notice that the constellation is upside down).

Sirus, also known as the Dog Star (it sits in the constellation of Canis Major) is about twice the size of our own sun, and 25 times more luminous. It is however much younger than our sun; Sirius is thought to be between 200-300 million years old, whereas our Sun is approximately 4.6 billion years old.