Australian Sky & Telescope — January 01, 2018

42 AUSTRALIAN SKY & TELESCOPE January 2018

Stingray in the sky

I

spent a few years fanatically working my way through observing

lists. But these days I’m just as likely to head out with no firm plan or

destination, and just see what the sky serves up. I don’t see as many

different things, but I discover more.

I was on a ramble through the Milky Way last summer when I

stumbled on a rich concentration of stars on the boundary between

Orion, the Hunter, and Taurus, the Bull. Even low-power binoculars

will show about two dozen stars in a fat crescent spanning 4° from

north to south. From the centre of the crescent, a chain of 5th- and

6th-magnitude stars runs off to the east-southeast. I can’t help but

see a stingray, swimming westward above Orion’s head.

It turns out that I wasn’t the first to snare this leviathan in the

depths of the sky. The central stars of the crescent make up the

proposed open cluster Collinder 65. I say ‘proposed’ because further

work has cast serious doubt on the cluster’s reality. With distances

ranging from less than 50 light-years to over 1,000, it seems that

the stars of Collinder 65 are probably just a chance alignment of

unrelated suns.

I’m okay with that. Science is a process of revising our

understanding of the universe in light of new information. So is

observational astronomy, for each of us who goes out exploring. The

subtle beauty of celestial objects often resides as much in the mind as

it does in the sky. I knew the stingray wasn’t real when it first swam

into my field of view. But it’s an enchanting sight, one that draws me

farther into the depths of the galaxy. 

To discover for yourself how much is up there, may I politely suggest

that you grab your binoculars and, well, get lost?

■ MATT WEDEL is out in the dark somewhere, taking his own advice.

M1

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TAURUS

The

Stingray

ORION

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(^5) ° (^) bi
nocular^ view
BINOCULAR HIGHLIGHT by Mathew Wedel
ONLINE
You can get a real-time sky chart
for your location at
skychart.skyandtelescope.com/
skychart.php
USING THE
STAR CHART
–1
Star
magnitudes
0
1
2
3
4
11
h
CER
YDRA
SEXTANS
CRATER
Regulus
ν
Fa
cin
g
F
ca
in
g
Ea
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EN
WHEN
Early December 1 a.m.
Late December Midnight
Early January 11 p.m.
Late January 10 p.m.
These are daylight saving times.
Subtract one hour if daylight
saving is not applicable.
HOW: Go outside within an hour
or so of a time listed above. Hold
the map out in front of you and
turn it around so the label for the
direction you’re facing (such as
west or northeast) is right-side up.
The curved edge represents the
horizon, and the stars above it on
the map now match the stars in
front of you in the sky. The centre
of the map is the zenith, the point
in the sky directly overhead.
FOR EXAMPLE: Tur n the
map around so the label “Facing
NE” is right-side up. About halfway
from there to the map’s centre is
the bright star Procyon. Go out
and look northeast halfway from
horizontal to straight up. There’s
Procyon!
NOTE: The map is plotted for
35° south latitude (for example,
Sydney, Buenos Aires, Cape
Town). If you’re far north of there,
stars in the northern part of the
sky will be higher and stars in the
south lower. Far south of 35° the
reverse is true.
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