October 8, 2018 - Shedding Light on a Cosmic Whirlpool
Shedding Light on a Cosmic Whirlpool The collective light from the billions of stars that comprise this ancient galaxy has fallen upon human eyes only recently—astronomically speaking. Scanning the constellation Canes Venatici with his telescope, comet hunter Charles Messier saw this nebulous object for the first time 245 years ago this week. He included it as the 51st entry in the list he was compiling of celestial objects that he didn’t want to confuse with comets, and it is now most commonly referred to as Messier 51, or more simply, M51. Its smaller companion galaxy was not discovered until 1781. In 1845, M51 became the first astronomical object to reveal a spiral structure. Also known as the Whirlpool Galaxy, M51 lies 30 million light-years away.
Image credit: X-ray: NASA/CXC/SAO; Optical: Detlef Hartmann; Infrared: NASA/JPL-Caltech
Weekly Calendar
October 8 - 14, 2018
Holidays - Sky Events - Space History
Monday 8
Thanksgiving Day (Canada)
Columbus Day
New Moon 11:47 PM ET
Draconid meteor shower
1873: Ejnar Hertzsprung born
Tuesday 9
Draconid meteor shower
1604: Kepler’s Supernova observed
2009: LCROSS detects water on the Moon
Wednesday 10
Venus 13° south of Moon
1846: William Lassell discovers Triton, moon of Neptune
1980: Very Large Array dedicated
1983: Venera 15 orbits Venus
2007: ISS Expedition 16 crew launched
Thursday 11
Jupiter 4° south of Moon
1968: Apollo 7 launched
1969: Soyuz 6, 7 & 8 in space at once
1994: Magellan mission ends
2000: STS-92 Discovery launched
2005: Shenzhou 6 launched
Friday 12
1964: Voskhod 1 launched, first three-person space flight
1977: Shuttle Enterprise’s first glide test without aerodynamic tailcone
2008: ISS Expedition 18 crew launched
Saturday 13
1773: Charles Messier observes M-51
1933: British Interplanetary Society founded
1968: Apollo 7 first live TV broadcast from space
2004: ISS Expedition 10 crew launched
Sunday 14
Mercury 7° north of Venus
Saturn 1.8° south of Moon
1947: World’s first supersonic flight
1957: USAF announces X-20 Dyna-Soar project
1983: Venera 16 arrives in orbit around Venus