Celestial hemisphere:  Northern  ·  Constellation: Cygnus (Cyg)  ·  Contains:  LBN 191  ·  LDN 868  ·  NGC 6974  ·  NGC 6979
NGC6979 HST, Sergiy_Vakulenko
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NGC6979 HST

NGC6979 HST, Sergiy_Vakulenko
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NGC6979 HST

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Description

Chaotic in appearance, these filaments of shocked, glowing gas break across planet Earth's sky toward the constellation of Cygnus, as part of the Veil Nebula. The Veil Nebula itself is a large supernova remnant, an expanding cloud born of the death explosion of a massive star. Light from the original supernova explosion likely reached Earth over 5,000 years ago. Blasted out in the cataclysmic event, the interstellar shock waves plow through space sweeping up and exciting interstellar material. The glowing filaments are really more like long ripples in a sheet seen almost edge on, remarkably well separated into the glow of ionized hydrogen and sulfur atoms shown in red and green, and oxygen in blue hues. Also known as the Cygnus Loop, the Veil Nebula now spans nearly 3 degrees or about 6 times the diameter of the full Moon. While that translates to over 70 light-years at its estimated distance of 1,500 light-years. Identified as Pickering's Triangle for a director of Harvard College Observatory and cataloged as NGC 6979, however nebula was discovered by Williamina Fleming's on photoslides.

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  • NGC6979 HST, Sergiy_Vakulenko
    Original
  • Final
    NGC6979 HST, Sergiy_Vakulenko
    C

C

Description: "Vanilla" colors

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NGC6979 HST, Sergiy_Vakulenko