In celebration of July 1 in Canada and July 4 in the USA, here is a photo of the Firecracker Galaxy, also known as NGC 6946 and Caldwell 12. The magnitude 9.6 face-on, type SAB spiral galaxy, 25 million light-years distant, is visible in good binoculars and backyard telescopes under dark skies. It straddles the…
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This terrific image by Amir H. Abolfath shows a deep exposure of the sky surrounding the bright reddish star Antares, the heart of Scorpius, which shines over the southern horizon on late June evenings. Antares is within the bright orange region at lower left. To its right is the enormous globular star cluster Messier 4.…
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A triangle of dark ash deposits left by long-extinct volcanoes are easily visible in the crater Alphonsus using any size of telescope when the moon is fully illuminated. Hello, Moon in June Stargazers! Here are your Astronomy Skylights for the week of June 12th, 2022 by Chris Vaughan. Feel free to pass this along to…
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A high resolution image of the moon’s Imbrium Basin, captured by the Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter. From Monday to Friday this week, the lunar terminator will march across this huge feature in the moon’s northern hemisphere, showing off its best aspects. Hello, June Stargazers! Here are your Astronomy Skylights for the week of June 5th, 2022…
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The glorious face-on spiral galaxy Messier 101, also known as the Pinwheel Galaxy, is located near the bright star Alkaid, at the tip of the Big Dipper’s handle. Visible even in binoculars, it is nearly overhead on April evenings. (Deep Sky Survey image from Stellarium) Hello, mid-April Stargazers! Here are your Astronomy Skylights for the…
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This north-up image of the Little Beehive Cluster, Messier 41 in Canis Major, shows the hot blue and cooler golden stars. It covers a thumb’s width of sky, measuring top to bottom. The green circle represents the field of view in a telescope at low magnification, 1.5 degrees. Hello, Winter Astronomers! Here are your Astronomy…
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This gorgeous image of the North America Nebula, and the Pelican Nebula to its right, was captured by Roman Kulesza. The pink colour arises from glowing hydrogen gas. Opaque dust in the foreground is separating the single large gas cloud into two nebulas, and producing the unique shapes. It was the SkyNews Photo of the…
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This image of Messier 13 in Hercules, the father of all globular star clusters visible from the Northern Hemisphere, was captured by Martin Pugh. Hundreds of thousands of stars, 25,000 light-years away from the sun, are arranged in a sphere by their mutual gravitational attraction. M13 is visible as a faint fuzzy patch to the…
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This terrific image of the sword of Orion was taken on January 7, 2019 by Rick Foster of Markham, Ontario. The colourful Messier 42 nebula is glowing by the light of young stars formed within it. The area shown here covers about 2 finger widths of the sky. Hello, mid-winter stargazers! Here are your Astronomy…
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This wide field image of Orion was captured on January 2, 2020 by Alan Dyer of Alberta, Canada. Orange-tinted Betelgeuse, which marks Orion’s shoulder (top centre), normally shines as bright as Orion’s opposite foot – the bright, blue star Rigel. In the last few weeks, Betelgeuse has diminished noticeably in apparent brightness – a possible…
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