why do we never see stars die?

Answer 1

good question

uhh, one was "seen" a couple months ago ... (here quoting)

"This burst was also much closer than normal, and the researchers identified it as originating in a star-forming galaxy about 440m light years away, towards the constellation Aries. The team soon realised they were witnessing the first stages of the death of a star.

Dr O'Brien continued: "The three on-board telescopes all detected a slowly brightening then fading object. The results suggest a broad jet expanded into the surroundings, but it was accompanied by a slower-moving and incredibly hot - two million degree - bubble of gas produced from the shock-wave of the exploding star."

Answer 2

We never see stars die because stars live for millions, billions or even trillions of years due to the very high hydrogen content of the stars. Stars have such great diameters that can store large amounts of its fuel, hydrogen. The length of the life of stars is further complicated by the fact that it takes a long time for light from the stars to reach the earth and another issue is the availability of clear night skies. Due to all the factors, therefore the chances of seeing one is very very small, zero perhaps.

Answer 3

The process of stellar evolution happens so slowly for the most part that all we can see is a snapshot of a star's current evolutionary state. The notable exception to this is a supernova, the massive explosion that ends the life of a large star. Several of these are seen every year, though there hasn't been one in our galaxy for hundreds of years.

We can also see stars that are in the last stages of life before going supernova (Wolf-Rayet stars) and stars in the process of forming planetary nebulae. In addition, we can see the supernova remnants and planetary nebulae left behind by stars that have died within the past few thousand years.

Answer 4

Well, if you mean when they die, it's because they are far away.

But we just recently actually recorded a star going supernova.
http://www.spaceflightnow.com/news/n0608/31grb/
The star emitted some X-ray bursts, and a number of ground based telescopes and the Swift satellite were turned on it, and they recorded the gamma ray burst indicative of black hole formation.

Of course, the event happened hundreds of millions of years ago, but the light (x-ray and gamma and visible) are just now reaching us.


Prior to this, we've only seen supernovae when all the noise and shouting were over, and enough of the junk had cleared out that you could see the visible light.

Answer 5

a.) because you and I can't see most of the stars that actually exist (they're either too dim or too far away or both)

b.) because the light from stars takes at least decades to get to earth, if not centuries, and so we wouldn't notice it until very long after the fact.

c.) it just doesn't happen that often. Also, falling stars aren't actually stars, they're parts of comets burning up in the earth's atmosphere, if I remember right.

Answer 6

we see them die but since most stars are so far away it takes millions if not billions of years for the light to reach us in fact my quess is the universe is so big that there cold be thousands of stars dying we just cant see them or the light hasn't reached us also when stars die they dont always form a black hole the could create a neuron star or they could have a super nova or a regular nova or they could just fizzle out quitely

Answer 7

Because their life expectancy is in the billions of years, about all we have is nebula, which is the result of a Super Nova, although there can be many other types of death for a star, what it depends on is the stars size

Answer 8

because there are too many city lights everywhere so, that is why it is so hard to view the stars in the sky you have to go futher out in the country in order to view stars where there are none light surrounding you. the more light there are the less stars there is. The less light there are the more stars you can see.

Answer 9

because stars dont die out they burn out all they are is gases in space some so big u could put the center where the sun is and reach the earth or some as small as the empire state building

Answer 10

because nobody notices that one star is disappearing right above us...we don't see them go because we're too busy going to clubs or partying and we never realize that the beauty is just in the sky...

there's always another star being made...but we should, once-in-a-while, look at the sky and watch the beauty of nature

:) :) :) :) :)