Kap

Its story

Kappa Cassiopeiae is a runaway blue supergiant, ejected long ago from its birthplace and now hurtling through interstellar space at some 1,100 km/s relative to its neighbours. Its stellar wind ploughs into the interstellar medium and carves a colossal bow shock —discovered by the Spitzer telescope— stretching four light-years ahead of the star, twelve light-years long and nearly two wide: an incandescent wake silently drawn across the dust of Cassiopeia.