A possible nova (not yet to be confirmed) was discovered by Astronomer John Seach, Chatsworth Island, NSW, Australia, on March 15th and reported to the IAU. See link below.
The possible Nova is easily located within the teapot shaped asterism of Sagittarius as these pictures show.
http://www.cbat.eps.harvard.edu/unconf/followups/J18365700-2855420.html
Pictures were taken this morning at around 5 am CST from a location along 50 Highway west from where I live in Lee’s Summit Missouri. These are cropped from the original which was taken with the following settings. 18 mm lens; 6-seconds; f3.5; ISO 1600.
The nova is currently at around 5th magnitude meaning that it could be seen with the naked eye in dark enough skies. I added apparent magnitudes for 4 stars near the Nova’s location.
From my picture location the sky was still too bright but I was pretty sure I saw the nova using 10×50 binoculars.
Click here to go to the Qué tal in the Current Skies web site for more observing information for this month.
Filed under: Astronomy, Astrophotography, Classroom, constellations, Globular Clusters, Observing, Saturn, Universe Tagged: 7x50 binoculars, astronomy, astrophotography, Australia, Chatsworth Island, John Seach, messier objects, milky way galaxy, nova, NSW, observing, sagittarius, saturn, Scorpius, Summit Missouri
