● Sirius

  Sirius is a star in Canis Major.

                                               
                                               
                                               
                                               
                      #####                    
                   ###########                 
                 ###############               
                #################              
                #################              
                #################              
                 ###############               
                   ###########                 
                      #####                    
                                               
                                               
                                               
                                               

  Type            White main-sequence star
  Constellation   Canis Major
  Magnitude       -1.5
  Spectral type   A1Vm
  Distance        9 light years
  Double star     components 11.2″ apart
  You need        naked eye from a dark sky

  Known as
  Bayer           α CMa
  Yale            HR 2491

  Physical
  Radius          1.7 times the Sun

  More information about Sirius

  Sirius is bright mainly because it is close: at 8.6 light years it is
  one of our nearest neighbours, and it is only about twice the width of
  the Sun. When it is low in the sky it flashes red and green as our
  atmosphere bends and splits its light, and it gets reported as an
  aircraft or something stranger more often than any other star. It has a
  companion, a white dwarf about the size of the Earth, the leftover core
  of a star that has stopped burning and is now cooling slowly, still hot
  enough to shine but far too small to be seen without a telescope. The
  name is the Greek Σείριος, "scorching", because its rising with the Sun
  announced the hottest weeks of the Mediterranean year. This is also
  where dog days comes from: Sirius sits in Canis Major, the great dog,
  and it is its brightest star.

  History
  Discovered   its white dwarf companion by Alvan Graham Clark, 1862

  Etymology
  From         Greek
  Reading      Seirios  ·  Σείριος
  Literally    scorching

  Bayer lettered the stars of each constellation in his Uranometria of
  1603, in order of brightness. He was working from Tycho's magnitudes by
  eye, and the order he recorded is often wrong.

  First published in 1930 by Yale astronomer Frank Schlesinger, and
  maintained since, the Yale Bright Star Catalogue lists every star down
  to magnitude 6.5. It contains 9,110 stars.

  where it is tonight:  skymap.sh/Sirius