IMAGES

OME 15,000 YEARS AGO our

ancestors witnessed a powerful supernova explosion in the constellation Cygnus. Millenniums later amateur
astronomers are reaping the benefits of
that cataclysmic event by observing the
outcome the beautiful Veil Nebula.
The brightest portions of this 2.7-wide
loop are its east (NGC 6992, also known
as the Cirrus Nebula) and west (NGC
6960) edges, which have become favorite targets for deep-sky enthusiasts.
They can be glimpsed with a 6-inch telescope under dark skies, but it takes a
larger instrument to bring out the more
delicate features (S&T: October 1994,
page 104). Only with photography is the
complete nebulas breathtaking detail
revealed, but even astrophotographers
are challenged to bring out the most
tenuous filaments in its central region.
Robert Townsend of Placerville, California, rose to that challenge with this 4hour exposure. Near the top of the
image is NGC 6992, the brightest portion of the Veil. Burnhams Celestial
Handbook describes it as a faint curved
arc like a ghostly white rainbow, over
one degree in length. Toward the bottom, crossing the field of the 4th-magnitude star 52 Cygni, is NGC 6960. While
this portion of the nebula is more challenging visually, its feathery, filamentary
appearance in photographs is just as
stunning. The remarkable nature of this
image is best revealed, however, by the
tremendous detail captured in the Veils
central region. Nearly invisible in even
the largest of amateur telescopes, much
of this nebulosity has no designation of
its own.
According to researchers using the
Hubble Space Telescope, when a supernovas blast wave plows into surrounding gas and dust, the target material is
heated and piled into sheets (S&T: May
1995, page 11). The delicate filaments
visible in Townsends image may actually be these sheets seen edge on.
Townsend employed a Takahashi E-160
camera, Tech Pan 4415 film and a 150angstrom-wide H-alpha interference filter. The camera was guided by a separate
3-inch refractor and an ST- 4 autoguider.
North is to the right.
SAMANTHA PARKER

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Sky & Telescope March 1997

1997 Sky Publishing Corp. All rights reserved.

1997 Sky Publishing Corp. All rights reserved.

March 1997 Sky & Telescope

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