01/18/2018 – Ephemeris – The spectacular Great Orion Nebula

This is Bob Moler with Ephemeris for Thursday, January 18th. The Sun will rise at 8:14. It’ll be up for 9 hours and 17 minutes, setting at 5:32. The Moon, 2 days past new, will set at 7:15 this evening.

The constellation Orion the hunter is the south-southeast at 9 p.m. its upright rectangle of four stars frame his belt of three stars in a straight line and still tilt a bit to the left. Below the belt is what appear to the unaided eye as three more stars arranged vertically, his sword. Binoculars aimed at the middle stars of the sword will find a glowing haze around those stars. That is the Great Orion Nebula. It is the birth place of stars, and is even illuminated by a clutch of four hot young stars. One of the discoveries of the Hubble space telescope are what appear, and are tiny cocoons of gas and dust in which stars condense and form. They are called Proplyds, which are short for protoplanetary disks. In each one is the red center, a young star just beginning to shine.

The times given are for the Traverse City/Interlochen area of Michigan. They may be different for your location.

Addendum

The lower part of Orion with the Great Orion Nebula. Created using Stellarium.

The Great Orion Nebula (M42) long exposure photograph by Scott Anttila. Includes all the sword stars.

A new video just posted by NASA