as of 03/28/2024 3:35 p.m.
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Type | Galaxy |
Constellation | Sagittarius |
Right ascension | 17h45'0'' |
Declination | -29°0'0'' |
Magnitude | 5 |
Distance | 20,000ly |
Size | 10800 arc min |
Catalog Designations | |
The milky way is what we call our home galaxy. When we look at the sky and see it, we are looking into the spiral arm in which our solar system is located. Image "ESO-VLT-Laser-phot-33a-07" by ESO - http://www.eso.org/gallery/v/ESOPIA/Paranal/phot-33a-07.tif.html. Licensed under CC BY 3.0 |
The following form will generate a PDF finder chart suitable for printing using to locate objects in the sky with your telescope!
The Date is only really useful for solar system objects, as deep space objects move measurably only on a galactic timescale.
The larger the F.O.V (field of view), the more "zoomed out" the object will appear. It can be helpful to print several charts of the same object with different field of views.
Limiting the magnitude (remember, lower magnitude means brighter!) of stars and objects can make sure your chart is not cluttered with dim objects that you may not be visible to you anyway. The defaults are good, but try experimenting with raising and lowering the values.
Naked eye
100 points
From Red Rock State Park in California I observed the outer arm of the milky way. It appears as a dim "river of milk" through the sky, passing through Orion and Perseus. I had been able to see this side of the Milky Way before. Dark skies are amazing.
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