WR 24


WR 24 is a Wolf-Rayet star in the constellation Carina. It is one of the most luminous stars known. At the edge of naked eye visibility it is also one of the brightest Wolf Rayet stars in the sky.
The spectrum of WR 24 has the characteristic strong nitrogen and helium emission lines of a WN star, but also lines of hydrogen that show Doppler-displaced absorption components. The lowest ionisation nitrogen emission lines are strongest, with NV lines being very weak. The HeI lines are weaker than the HeII lines, leading to a WN6ha spectral class. The spectral type is annotated with a letter w, indicating weaker emission than for a typical WN6 star.
WR 24 is thought to be a member of the open cluster Collinder 228, sometimes considered to be just an extension of the rich cluster Trumpler 16. It lies on the southwestern side of the Carina Nebula. Collinder 228 and the Carina Nebula are approximately 2.2 kpc away. However, the Gaia Data Release 2 parallax gives a distance around