Alpha Centauri is the name for the brightest apparent star in the southern constellation of Centaurus, which is the closest naked-eye star to the sun, and the name for the multi-star system that composes that apparent star. To the unaided eye this multi-star system appears as a single star, whose total visual magnitude would identify it as the fourth brightest star in the night sky. The visible part of Alpha Centauri is actually a binary star system, the individual stars being designated Alpha Centauri A and Alpha Centauri B, or, collectively, Alpha Centauri AB. They are 1.34 parsecs or 4.37 light years away from our Sun. However, a third star called Proxima Centauri, or Proxima, which is not visible to the naked eye, is likely to be a gravitational companion of this binary system. The whole (potential) trinary star system may also be called Alpha Centauri.
An ANSA Public Service Announcement to coincide with the launch of 'Project Liberty' under Colonel Taylor indicated that the goal of the project was to reach the constellation of Centaurus, four light years away.
In 1980, ANSA astronauts Virdon, Burke and Jones were on a mission towards Alpha Centauri aboard the Probe Six when they passed through a dimensional time vortex and were propelled over 1,000 years into the future. They crashlanded back on Earth, with only Virdon and Burke surviving.
