Perhaps in the near future the inhabitants of the Earth will witness a rare event that occurs once every several thousand years. According to insiders at the Mauna Kea Observatory, Hawaii, the red giant Betelgeuse is rapidly changing shape
Over the past 16 years, the star has lost its circular shape, rapidly contracting at the poles, while the star's equator is still held by centrifugal force. These are clear signs that there are weeks or months before the star goes supernova.
What will this rarest event look like from earth? Suddenly a very bright star will flash in the sky. "Very bright" means a degree of brightness equal to at least a full moon and at most a full sun. Such a space show will last for about six weeks, which means more than one and a half months of "white nights" in certain parts of the planet, the rest of the people will enjoy two or three additional hours of daylight hours and the delightful sight of an exploding star at night.
In two or three weeks after the explosion, the star will begin to fade, and in a few years it will finally turn into a Crab nebula for a terrestrial observer.
After the explosion, waves of charged particles will reach the Earth in several centuries, and the inhabitants of the Earth will receive a small (4–5 orders of magnitude less lethal) dose of ionizing radiation. But there is no need to worry in any case - as scientists say, there is no threat to the Earth and its inhabitants, but such an event is unique in itself - the last evidence of a supernova explosion on Earth is dated 1054.