Astronomy Without a Telescope
- Phecda (stars.astro.illinois.edu)
PHECDA (Gamma Ursae Majoris). Few figures in the sky move us more than the Big Dipper, its seven bright stars laid out in a long bent row that the British call the Plough. All but one of its stars are second magnitude, though Phecda, the third one in from the end of the bowl, and southernmost of the bowl stars, is just on the edge of third (2.44).
- Phecda (Wikipedia)
Phecda /ˈfɛkdə/, also called Gamma Ursae Majoris (γ Ursae Majoris, abbreviated Gamma UMa, γ UMa), is a star in the constellation of Ursa Major. Since 1943, the spectrum of this star has served as one of the stable anchor points by which other stars are classified. Based upon parallax measurements with the Hipparcos astrometry satellite, it is located at distance of around 83.2 light-years (25.5 parsecs) from the Sun.
