The Caldwell Objects

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103 a hangman's noose, can be seen at the bar's southern end. Another nebulous arm juts from the bar's northern end, then heads northwest before curving slightly south to all but touch a slightly swollen cluster of stars. Together the noose, the arm, and the cluster look remarkably like a wide-eyed celestial seahorse navigating an ocean of nebulosity. Due east of the Tarantula's central star cluster, a small but bright coil of nebulosity encompasses a dark bay, east of which lies another larger, though less conspicuous, bay encircled by a faint prominence of feathery 408 nebulosity. The southern extension of this latter feature flows into the eastern edge of the "hangman's noose," forming the True Lover's Knot (a bowknot used as a symbol of love). This name was assigned to the nebula by the imaginative and romantic 19th-century explorer of the skies, Adm. William Henry Smyth. The Tarantula's grandeur does not end with these loops. Bright nebulous extensions, each laced with wisps of fine detail, can be traced to the north and west, and several stellar groupings lie in and around the glowing gaseous loops. The fact that amateur astronomers can see so much detail in a galaxy other than our Milky Way is a marvel unto itself. If the Tarantula Nebula were as close as the Orion Nebula, it would illuminate a patch of sky nearly 60° across, outshining Venus. Keep that in mind when looking through the eyepiece at the Tarantula Nebula, and the object will transcend its ghostly appearance and stand before you as a rare vision of celestial magnificence. By the way, despite the Tarantula's association with the LMC, which is summarily considered a Southern Hemisphere object, the nebula can be seen from the Northern Hemisphere during upper culmination. Kevin Krisciunas observed Supernova 1987A after it appeared about 18' west and 10' south of the Tarantula's core. He was standing on the nearly 14,000-foot summit of Mauna Kea on the Big Island of Hawaii (19° 50' Ν latitude). Deep-Sky Companions: The Caldwell Objects
104 NGC 362 Type: Globular Cluster Con: Tucana RA:01 h 03 m 14.3 s Dec: -70° 50' 54" Mag: 6.4 Diam: 14' Dist: 27,700 light-years Disc: James Dunlop, included in his 1827 catalog, though probably noted throughout history as a star J. H ERSCHEL: Fine, highly condensed globular cluster, pretty suddenly brighter in the middle, diameter 4'. (h 2375) GC / NGC: Globular cluster of stars, very bright, very 106 47 Tucanae; Xi Tucanae NGC 104 Type: Globular Cluster Con: Tucana RA: 00 h 24 m 05.2 s Dec:-72° 04'51" Mag: 3.95 Diam: 50' Dist: 14,700 light-years Disc: Abbe Nicolas Louis de Lacaille, included in his 1755 catalog, though probably noted throughout history as a star J. H ERSCHEL: The great cluster preceding the Nubecula Minor [Small Magellanic Cloud]. Estimated diameter of the denser portion 5'; of the whole (not, however, including those stragglers) 8'. Stars 14[th to] The Caldwell Objects large, very compressed, very much brighter in the middle, stars of magnitude 13 to 14. 16[th] magnitude] and one of 12th magnitude] north preceding [to the northwest of] the center. Excessively compressed, (h 2322) 104 & 106 GC / NGC: Globular cluster of stars, remarkable, very bright, very large, very much compressed in the middle. 409
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DEEP-SKY COMPANIONS The Caldwell Ob
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DEEP-SKY COMPANIONS The Caldwell Ob
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Contents Foreword by Patrick Moore
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to be more difficult than others, s
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years of thought and observation ar
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XII position, type, angular size, a
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sky and share its splendors. There
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CHAPTER 1 About This Book O N ONE S
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times vog can back up and cause a s
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when there is moisture in the air.
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Herschel's original observations, p
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we use today and to one another? I
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SIMBAD (Set of identifications, Mea
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Caldwell 26. The objects in the Cal
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tion near the edges of the charts).
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nights of observing. Unless otherwi
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CHAPTER 2 The Caldwell Objects 1 1
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Because of its location far from th
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as strongly energized as would be e
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suggested by the patchiness of NGC
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4 NGC 7023 Type: Reflection Nebula
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astronomers found direct evidence o
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and his contemporaries. Why then wa
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6 Cat's Eye Nebula NGC 6543 Type: P
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Eighth-magnitude NGC 6543 is locate
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7 NGC 2403 Type: Mixed Spiral Galax
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according to theory, the gas densit
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8 Ghost’s Goblet NGC 559 Type: Op
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One other thing adds to the cluster
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RA: 22 h 56.8 m Dec: +62° 37' Mag:
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nebula is a near impossibility, eve
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1 0 The Horseshoe Cluster NGC 663 T
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heart of the cluster, dividing it i
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appears to be the edge of a rapidly
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1 2 NGC 6946 Type: Mixed Spiral Gal
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to the west by a row of similarly b
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the south-southwest. NGC 457, howev
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photographs. The cluster's bright "
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play begins at 8:00 p.m., when my e
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ightness by summing the contributio
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jewels. Here are sapphires, rubies,
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15 outer shell falls upon the retin
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"knots" have also been noted by exp
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tight gathering of a half-dozen rou
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1 7 NGC 147 Type: Elliptical Galaxy
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the center. A faint outer halo is a
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1 9 Cocoon Nebula IC 5146 (nebula)
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trickle into the pool surrounding t
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2 0 North America Nebula NGC 7000 T
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egion's size and mass extreme when
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The Caldwell Objects 20 87
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2 1 Box Galaxy NGC 4449 Type: Irreg
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fuse but obvious glow of patchy lig
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qualifier—the word "light" — ha
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with a sheen of light, especially a
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1003, NGC 1023, and NGC 1058 (a nic
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Way) that pop in and out of view as
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RA: 03 h 19 m 48 s Dec: +41° 30.7'
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Through the 4-inch, NGC 1275 is les
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(300,000 light-years), Pal 4 (360,0
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26 Silver Needle Galaxy NGC 4244 Ty
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2 7 Crescent Nebula NGC 6888 Type:
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Observatory, England) still lists a
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pie refractors and inefficient spec
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29 NGC 5005 Type: Mixed Spiral Gala
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s h a edges. r p However, Christian
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ulars; challenge yourself and your
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NGC 7331 is extended much farther t
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away" stars escaped the confines of
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sweep the telescope in a north-sout
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highly suspect by some. However, in
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33 Network Nebula; Bridal Veil Nebu
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A quarter-second later, the star en
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under the dark skies of Seagrave Ob
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35 NGC 4889 Type: Elliptical Galaxy
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magnitude 12.2 some 18' to the east
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36 NGC 4559 Type: Mixed Spiral Gala
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Comae Berenices, the obvious northe
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3 7 NGC 6885 Type: Open Cluster Con
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pressed, stars of magnitude 6 to 11
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of Herschel's telescope. W then e e
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see the dark needle near the third
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sion of a "thin flat ring of enormo
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(which does not appear on Sky Atlas
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not be found in planetary nebulae,
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star in a large naked-eye triangle
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4 0 NGC 3626 Type: Lenticular Galax
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40 NGC 4546 in Virgo, NGC 4138 in C
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Northern Hemisphere, and people cel
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magnitude field star 2' to the nort
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this state of affairs.) The Hyades
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4 2 NGC 7006 Type: Globular Cluster
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each square arcminute of its disk s
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4 3 Electric Arc NGC 7814 Type: Spi
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hook as my "train route." Start at
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230 billion Suns and a physical dia
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4 5 NGC 5248 Type: Mixed Spiral Gal
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of the field. Those living under da
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1" in a mere four days. Clearly, La
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porarily) even the most practiced o
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stragglers are stars that appear to
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4 8 NGC 2775 Type: Spiral Galaxy (S
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with a CCD camera — discovered a
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this wreathlike network of dust and
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fuzzy patch of light with the unaid
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known as NGC 2244; and NGC 2239 sho
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At a glance the two stars at the cl
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On four plates taken with the Bruce
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years. A total of 43 star-cluster c
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5 2 NGC 4697 Type: Elliptical Galax
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northeast of the sixth star in the
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53 The Spindle NGC 3115 Type: Lenti
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and the 100-inch telescopes atop Mo
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emerge, followed by a diffuse outer
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perfection than is actually the cas
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jets, like a stream of water from t
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5 6 Pac-Man Nebula NGC246 Type: Pla
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the triple-alpha process, wherein t
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5 7 Barnard's Galaxy NGC 6822 Type:
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to show how the galaxy's western re
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core and limber arms, which, he wro
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esembles Jupiter . . . '" Smyth's f
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years" and suggests amateurs monito
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6 0 Ringtail Galaxy; Rataail Galaxy
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war. X-ray images taken by the Rosa
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W. Sinnott's NGC 2000.0 has a visua
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62 Milkweed Seed Galaxy NGC247 Type
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through the narrow haze. But give t
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was more readily seen in binoculars
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Society. Accepting that distance, w
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any large telescope that can provid
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ought it to our attention in the Fe
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inch the cluster shows a pyramid of
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NGC 253 is the brightest member of
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magnitude stars, one just to the ea
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6 6 NGC5694 Type: Globular Cluster
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you see its core dancing? Its starl
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cosmologist Halton Arp (Max-Planck
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and kinked. All this detail is wrap
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telescope. But seeing it takes more
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streamers begin to appear, but they
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tounding, because NGC 6302 is a mag
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70 Southern Pinwheel NGC300 Type: S
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would John Herschel suddenly fault
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Dunlop discovered NGC 55 with his 9
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even when crossing the meridian. Co
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"nebulous clusters" (Class II); and
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galaxy's disk and halo. NGC 2477 ap
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condensed, almost to the very margi
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The asymmetry remains at high power
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other popular nickname, the Eight-B
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longed look, the object displays a
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times larger than the full Moon. In
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emains of a globular cluster that w
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he classified them accordingly. NGC
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NGC 6231). Under averted vision the
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7 7 Centaurus A NGC5128 Type: Pecul
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Harvard College Observatory's 24-in
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at 16 million light-years. If you s
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78 NGC 6541 Type: Globular Cluster
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seems to fragment into tiny stars,
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sense, evinced by any known cluster
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12th-magnitude double star. The clu
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original with Bayer, but goes back
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Omega Centauri is generally regarde
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glitter all come to mind as the clu
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shattered remains of their diminuti
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It's a nice even disk of l0th-magni
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with the fiery reddish light of hyd
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nebulosity when he viewed the regio
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the two jets of radio-wave-emitting
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pair of tweezers. A fairly bright s
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suggest that our universe may be on
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8 5 Omicron Velorum Cluster IC2391
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Nicolas Louis de Lacaille, however,
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much sky as does the full Moon, tho
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timates, making it 2 billion years
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NGC 5822. Don't be surprised if you
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89 S Normae Cluster NGC 6087 Type:
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fact, if you look about 7' southwes
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lowing night fell clear, when Hersc
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Page 379 and 380: 9 2 Eta Carinae Nebula GC 3372 Type
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Page 389 and 390: 1 0 1 NGC 6744 Type: Barred Spiral
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Page 399 and 400: 9 5 NGC 6025 Type: Open Cluster Con
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Page 415 and 416: 1 0 0 Lambda Centauri Cluster Colli
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Page 429 and 430: ters it has had thus far with the g
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Page 435 and 436: 1 0 5 Southern Butterfly NGC 4833 T
Page 437 and 438: stars"). Lacaille also likened NGC
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Page 441 and 442: 107 NGC 6101 Type: Globular Cluster
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Page 461 and 462: 19 N G C 6 2 8 1 T y O p e C : n l
Page 463 and 464: C Name Type Con. R.A. Dec Mag. Size
Page 465 and 466: C Name Type Con. R.A. Dec Mag. Size
Page 467 and 468: Appendix B Why Messier Did N o t i
Page 469 and 470: A typical pattern for evening hunti
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Page 473 and 474: Initially Herschel made his living
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tube's front end. This meant that t
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Star in Collo Ceti" about the star
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years, Herschel would observe some
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fluid, but added that ages of obser
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Appendix D Photo Credits in order o
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A Abell426, 101 Acrux, 388, 392, 39
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index Caldwell 44, 173, 176-178 Cal
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and nebulae, 271, 274, 362 and open
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Hevelius, Johannes, 72, 81, 452 Hip
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M103, 49-50, 58-59 M110, 77 MACHOs.
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NGC 3324, 369 NGC 3372 (Caldwell 92
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Perseus Cluster, 101 Phi Cas Cluste
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Τ Tarantula Nebula (Caldwell 103),
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