If you have never seen a galactic maternity ward, now is a great time. The brightest and closest such star-birthing molecular cloud is the Orion Nebula. It is the only galactic maternity ward that is easily visible to the naked eye. It is the middle star in the sword than hangs down from the belt of Orion. In the two accompanying photos the three belt stars form a vertical line. The three sword stars form a shorter line to the right and slightly below the bright belt stars. This is how the Orion constellation looks when it is rising in the early evening this month is the 48 contiguous US states. By midnight Orion will be high above the southern horizon, the belt nearly horizontal, the sword nearly vertical. If you have a pair of binoculars, you will see the Orion Nebula as a hazy patch of green light. The bigger the diameter of your binoculars objective lenses, the more spectacular view you will enjoy. I took these two photos on December 20, 2008 in Monument Valley with a point-and-shoot camera. Lacking a tripod, I set the camera on top of a rock. The exposure times were about 15 seconds. Even in just 15 seconds the earths rotation is sufficient to streak the star images. The second photo shows star images down to the eight magnitude.
Posted on: Fri, 26 Dec 2014 23:49:52 +0000
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