November nights

NT Dark Skies
Hi Space watchers
Last night saw a good clear night for our monthly observing night at our Dhupma rd site.
The Iridium flares were spectacular & right on time !
There was a lot of meteor activity centered on a minor shower with it's radiant in Taurus (the radiant is the point where the meteors seem to be coming from).
Great views were had of nearby galaxy groups centered around Andromeda & Sculptor, the Andromeda group being approx. 3 million LY (light years) away & the Sculptor group being 3 times that distance.

The Great Orion Nebula is now coming into plain view , this is an easy one to spot.
Look for the middle star of the "Handle of the saucepan" IE: Orions Sword handle.
Orion rises in the east at about 9pm in November.
Try looking at it with a pair of binoculars, you will be see a massive star forming region 1500 LY. Away and about 30 LY. in size. This makes it 7 times bigger in size than the distance our sun is from the nearest star Proxima Centuri.

The next celestial event of note is the Geminid Meteor Shower on the 13th of December with the peak predicted in the early hrs of the morning, this shower MIGHT reach 100 meteors/Hr.
Clear Skies