This object is a pair of interacting galaxies located 340 million light years away in the constellation of Hercules at a declination of +49 degrees. In his
Arp catalog, Dr. Arp classified this object into the category of Elliptical Galaxies Connected to Spirals.
The spiral galaxy at center is UGC 10814. This magnitude 16 galaxy spans just over 1 arc-minute in our apparent view, with a Milky Way like diameter of 120,000 light years.
The bright elliptical to the upper right is MCG+08-31-041. This magnitude 15 galaxy spans just under 1 arc-minute in our apparent view, which corresponds to a diameter of 90,000 light years.
The highlight of this object is the beautiful star streams, extending from the spiral both left and right for a total length of 700,000 light years. The left stream ends in a bright star cloud. Some sources say that this cloud is a 3rd galaxy, but it doesn’t look that way to me. The right side bridges to the elliptical with a fantastic faint looping path that occurs only rarely with these objects. I am not sure how such a path is created.
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