Southern Pole Star (South Star)
Currently, there is no South Star as useful as Polaris. Sigma Octantis is the naked-eye star closest to the south Celestial pole, but at apparent magnitude 5.45 it is too faint to serve as a useful pole star. Its angular separation from the pole is about 1° (as of 2000). The Southern Cross constellation functions as an approximate southern pole constellation, by pointing to where a southern pole star would be. At the equator it is possible to see both Polaris and the Southern Cross.
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Famous quotes containing the words southern, pole and/or star:
“I walked on the banks of the tincan banana dock and sat down under the huge shade of a Southern Pacific locomotive to look at the sunset over the box house hills and cry.”
—Allen Ginsberg (b. 1926)
“The discovery of the North Pole is one of those realities which could not be avoided. It is the wages which human perseverance pays itself when it thinks that something is taking too long. The world needed a discoverer of the North Pole, and in all areas of social activity, merit was less important here than opportunity.”
—Karl Kraus (1874–1936)
“A brush had left a crooked stroke
Of what was either cloud or smoke
From north to south across the blue;
A piercing little star was through.”
—Robert Frost (1874–1963)