Celestial hemisphere:  Southern  ·  Constellation: Aquarius (Aqr)  ·  Contains:  M 73  ·  NGC 6994
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M73, Gary Imm
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M73

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M73, Gary Imm
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M73

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Description

This is the second least impressive Messier object and is only included here for completeness. This object is an asterism formed by four unrelated stars located in the southern constellation Aquarius. The four stars that form the Y-shaped asterism only appear close to each other in the sky because they are located along the same line of sight when seen from Earth. This object was previously thought to be a poorly populated open star cluster and its stars were believed to be bound by gravitational attraction. Today, it is known to be one of the three Messier objects that are not deep sky objects at all. The others are double star Messier 40 and the Milky Way star cloud Messier 24 (Sagittarius Star Cloud).

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M73, Gary Imm

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