I saw a star next to Regulus. Is Regulus a double star?

On Thu, 25 Mar 1999 you wrote:

> Is Regulus,Alpha Leonis, a double star?I was looking at it and noticed a star
> next to it.I checked on it the next few nights and saw the same thing.I
> checked a star chart and it said Regulus was a double star,177 seconds
> apart,and at 8.5 magnitude.The reason I am asking you is because for some
> reason I don't really belive the star chart.So many charts say different
> things,I don't really know what to belive.Oh yeah Thanks very much for
> answering my last question,it helped alot.

Hi,

I checked SIMBAD, a stellar catalogue used by astronomers. According to
1990 research on nearby star systems, Regulus is a quadruple star system.
Regulus itself is the brightest star, and has a close red dwarf
companion. Then, separated by 2 or 3 arcminutes, is an 8th magnitude red
dwarf pair (a K star and an M star). In a typical amateur telescope or
pair of binoculars, you should be able to split the wide double, but
probably not all 4 stars. If you don't believe that this is what you
saw, the other possibility is that you saw internal reflections off the
optics of your telescope. This is a commn problem (even among
multi-million dollar telescopes) when you look at bright objects.
Myself, I sometimes see "double" stars when I'm observing with my glasses
on, also due to an internal reflection.

I hope this clears up your mystery a bit, and thanks for writing.

Sincerely,
Kurtis Williams

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