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Touring Orion And Surrounds

Epick Crom

By Epick Crom
in Observing - Reports

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Epick Crom

Epick Crom

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Hi my fellow stargazers! I took the opportunity last night to take a grand tour of Orion and neighbouring constellations Lepus and Canis Major. This is a fantastic area of the night sky! All observations carried out using my 10 inch dobsonian:

ORION

M42: It would be criminal to not start an observing session in Orion without starting first with the mighty Orion Nebula. What a beauty 😍. Trapezium looked great with all 6 stars visible. M42 seemed to have a more bluish colour than its usual green.

Meissa (Lambda Orionis): Delightful double star, with a line of stars running below and a bit above it. 

NGC 2022: My first time observing this planetary nebula. Situated not too far from Meissa, this planetary appeared faint in my 10 inch but distinctive non the less. Showed surprising detail at 343x. I could just make out what appeared to be a brighter lump on one end.

NGC 1999: Another first for me, I was delighted to pick out this faint nebula. Just detected it at 171x using my new 82 degree eyepiece.

LEPUS

R Leporis: This a a beautiful carbon star! Deep red like a celestial drop of blood!

M79: Nice globular cluster, I started to see some resolution of its outlying stars at 200x.

Arneb(Alpha Leporis): Interesting double star in that the primary is mag.2.5 and the secondary is mag 11.2 at  35.4" seperation. A nice sight.

IC 418: The Spirograph Nebula. Bright and distinctive, this planetary is also known as the Raspberry Nebula, I could not see the raspberry colour though, just a vivid greenish hue. This a a great target to observe!

CANIS MAJOR

M 41: Large and bright Messier open cluster. I saw a few striking red and orange stars mixed in. 

NGC 2362: What a beauty! This open cluster never fails to take my breath away, a sprinkling of glorious blue gems surrounding Tau Canis Majoris which as an additional treat is a nice double. It's objects like this which make me wonder why not everyone is practicing astronomy?! A real gem.

NGC 2360: Fairly rich open cluster. Looks good at medium magnifications. This cluster was famously discovered by Caroline Herschel

Sirius: Our night skies brightest star. I love the five faint stars below it that form a "W" shape. I tried my hardest to split it and glimpse the Pup, but no luck on this night.

I completed the night by just looking up and admiring the view naked eye. Not as spectacular as my dark site view but I appreciate it non the less. Light pollution or not we must take what we can get! Wishing you all a Merry Christmas and keep looking up!

Joe

 

 

 

 

Edited by Epick Crom
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glafnazur

glafnazur

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2 hours ago, Kon said:

Thanks for the nice report Joe, I could mentally 'see' the night sky through it. Merry Christmas and clear skies!!

Agreed, a great report, next best thing to being out there myself as all I have is cloud here in the UK at the moment.

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Pixies

Pixies

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On 23/12/2021 at 10:35, Epick Crom said:

IC 428: The Spirograph Nebula. Bright and distinctive, this planetary is also known as the Raspberry Nebula, I could not see the raspberry colour though, just a vivid greenish hue. This a a great target to observe!

 

Thanks. Some good objects in there, some  I have yet to see. Just need some clear nights!

IC428 - do you mean IC418? The former is in Orion. 

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Epick Crom

Epick Crom

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On 26/12/2021 at 22:08, Pixies said:

 

Thanks. Some good objects in there, some  I have yet to see. Just need some clear nights!

IC428 - do you mean IC418? The former is in Orion. 

Hi Pixies. Whoops you are right, I meant IC 418! Thanks for picking that up👍

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Epick Crom

Epick Crom

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1 hour ago, Pixies said:

How are things down-under? Have you managed to observe comet Leonard, yet?

Things are ok down under @Pixies, only very hot and wearing masks everywhere! We just had our hottest Christmas day on record (43 degrees 😥). Unfortunately I have not yet observed comet Leonard as summer twilight ends late and by that time comet Leonard is low behind my house. Looking at Sky Safari I will have a good chance on new year's day as it will be higher and set later. That will be an awesome start to the new year! How are things on your side? Cheers mate

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