deep sky

Touring the Summer Triangle

June 28, 2024 by Brian Ventrudo Filed Under: Deep Sky

Long-exposure images of the Summer Triangle (credit: Tien-Chu Chang, Flickr) — Long-exposure image of the Summer Triangle (credit: Tien-Chu Chang/Flickr)

While not a constellation itself, the Summer Triangle dominates the overhead sky in the northern summer and autumn months and guides stargazers to other stars, constellations, and deep-sky sights. The vertices of the triangle are marked by three bright stars Vega, Deneb, and Altair, each of which belong to true constellations Lyra, Cygnus, and Aquila, respectively. The image below shows the Summer Triangle rising as seen from mid-northern latitudes at 10 p.m. in mid July. The triangle is big: it spans about two full hand widths held at arm’s length. The triangle can be seen well south of the equator, too, above the northern horizon. Southern stargazers call it the “Northern Triangle” or the “Winter Triangle” [Read more…] about Touring the Summer Triangle

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The Eta Carinae Nebula

May 24, 2024 by Brian Ventrudo Filed Under: Astronomy Images and Video, Deep Sky

The Eta Carinae Nebula, the jewel of the southern-hemisphere constellation Carina, the Keel, is the most spectacular example of an active star factory in all the heavens. The nebula is about 260 light years across, some seven times larger than the Orion Nebula. And while 7,500 light years away, five times farther away than Orion, it’s still easily visible to the even the most casual stargazer as a large frosty patch three times as wide as the full Moon in the Milky Way west of the constellation Crux, the Southern Cross [Read more…] about The Eta Carinae Nebula

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The Crescent Nebula

September 17, 2021 by Brian Ventrudo Filed Under: Deep Sky

Of the many deep-sky sights in the constellation Cygnus along the rich band of the northern Milky Way, the Crescent Nebula (NGC 6888) isn’t the biggest or brightest, but it still finds its place on the target list of many astrophotographers and visual observers. This shimmering and intricate arc of glowing gas presents a rare example of a massive star in its end stages as it ejects mass at a furious rate on its way to a violent demise as a supernova.

[Read more…] about The Crescent Nebula

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A Northern Observer Discovers the Southern Skies

June 20, 2018 by Joe Bergeron Filed Under: Stargazing

The Southern Cross and the Coalsack. Image credit: Joe Bergeron.

Imagine a young stargazer living at a latitude of 42 degrees north.

Polaris, the fabled North Star, shines far above the northern horizon. Around it wheel the circumpolar constellations of Ursa Major, Cassiopeia, Draco, and Cepheus, ancient landmarks of the northern sky.

In the south, the tail of Scorpius brushes low along the horizon for a few brief months of Summer. Those stars are among the most southerly he can see. But from his star maps, the young stargazer knows that farther south lie some of the greatest wonders of the entire celestial sphere, all the way down to the obscure South Celestial Pole. Yet the poor lad can never see them. The obstinate bulk of the spherical Earth hides them forever [Read more…] about A Northern Observer Discovers the Southern Skies

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Moving Stars

May 21, 2018 by Brian Ventrudo Filed Under: Science

Like the drift of the continents or the erosion of great mountain ranges on Earth, the motion of the stars across the sky is almost imperceptibly small over the paltry span of a human lifetime. But in this quite astonishing video made with data from the European Space Agency’s (ESA’s) Gaia spacecraft, which compresses 5 million years of star motion into a few minutes, you can see more than 2 million stars move across the sky like grains of pollen floating in a breeze. It is mesmerizing (and unexpectedly calming) [Read more…] about Moving Stars

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