Dark Nebula in Cygnus

[AndyWB]

On Sunday I was observing Cygnus, trying to catch the North America Nebula, but as it was near zenith it was proving difficult. As I scanned around, I came across this big, dark splodge. At first I thought I was somehow seeing my secondary, or had my eye in the wrong place, but then I realised that I could move away from it and come back to it - that it wasn't an error, but was what I was seeing.

Interested now, I looked at it for a while. It looked like a large dark cloud in space. It was large, round, but with 'wings' at about 12 and 9 o'clock. You could see where it started to obscure stars behind it, as it faded into darkness. The 'wing' at 9 o'clock seemed to 'break up', rather than fade out. "Ah", I thought, "Dark nebula. Or a number of them. But where am I looking?". I should have drawn it, but forgot to even try.

A little scanning around found M39, then NGC7082 and NGC7062. Sure of this position, I went back to the dark thing... but Sky & Telescope pocket atlas didn't show much - just a small entry 'LDN 970'. I made my notes and moved on.

When I got home, though, I discovered that SkySafari can highlight dark nebulae, so I found where I was looking. The outer circle roughly matches my FOV

And I discovered the main thing I think I was seeing was LDN 989:

...though I think I was seeing some of the dark nebulae around 7-8 o'clock too.

It really did look like a big dark cloud in the sky. However, I can find little information on these - anyone know where I can find out more? It doesn't seem like these are things photographed very often...

[AndyWB]

Oh, and the images are inverted - as seen through a reflector.

[michael.h.f.wilkinson]

There are quite a few dark nebulae in that region, I have bagged a couple, but I am not sure I got the one you bagged. There is actually a small dark spot northwards of the "Hudson Bay" spot of the N.A. Nebulae .

[Steve Ward]

Barnard's Dark Nebula Catalogue  here .... http://www.dvaa.org/AData/Barnard.html