Sirius
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Sirius (also known as Alpha Canis Majoris, Alpha Canaris or the Alpha system) is a binary star system in Federation space consisting of companion stars named Sirius A and Shahr, located about 2.6 parsecs (8.6 light years) from Earth, where it is visible in the constellation of Canis Major. It is the location of the planet Alpha III, an important Federation colony. (TOS references: Star Fleet Technical Manual, Star Trek Spaceflight Chronology)
The Dogon of Mali are believed to have been visited thousands of years ago by aliens from Sirius. In 1940, Benny Russell had a vision where a Dogon encountered one of the aliens who died soon after. (DS9 novelization: Far Beyond the Stars)
- The Dogon people are believed to have known of the existence of Sirius and its companion star.
On several occasions in 2364, viewscreen readouts aboard the USS Enterprise-D showed the location of Sirius, in the form of charts from the Enterprise library computer. (TNG episodes: "The Naked Now", "The Last Outpost", "Conspiracy"
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[edit] Astronomical data
- Alpha I
- Has no atmosphere, and is geologically dead. An asteroid belt separates it from Alpha II.
- Alpha II
- Has a highly poisonous atmosphere and is very geologically active.
- Alpha III
- Has 7 moons. Another asteroid belt separates Alpha III from the trojan planet system of Alpha IV and V.
- Alpha IV
- Gas giant, has 12 moons
- Alpha V
- Has 29 moons. Alpha IV and V are gas giants that slowly revolve around each others as they orbit the star system.
[edit] Background
The Chronology depicted Sirius's name and distance from Earth on star chart illustrations, but since it is a "real" star system, modern scientists know a few things about its makeup that weren't in its Star Trek mentions. It is notable that Sirius was briefly glimpsed onscreen in canon productions of Star Trek because the production staff copied their star charts from the earlier, non-canon Chronology. Its close proximity to Earth, Sirius is in the vicinity of sector 006 and is therefore a Beta Quadrant star system, directly on the edge of the Alpha Quadrant. The Worlds of the Federation reference book claims there are no moons to Alpha III, despite the FASA RPG information. The Federation FASA supplement claims this system contains two Class M worlds but doesn't identify the other world.
[edit] References
[edit] Links
- Sirius article at Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.
- Sirius article at Memory Alpha, the wiki for canon Star Trek.
- Sirius at the Internet Stellar Database.
- Sirius at SolStation.com.
