NGC 6960 - Veil Nebula Triptych
The Veil Nebula is a cloud of heated and ionized gas and dust in the constellation Cygnus about 2400 light years ( 151.78 million AU ) away. The source supernova was a star 20 times more massive than the Sun which exploded between 10,000 and 20,000 years ago. At the time of the explosion, the supernova would have appeared brighter than Venus in the sky, and visible in the daytime. The remnants have since expanded to cover an area of the sky about 6 times the diameter of the full Moon. Blasted out in the cataclysmic event, the interstellar shock waves plow through space sweeping up and exciting interstellar material. The glowing filaments are really more like long ripples in a sheet seen almost edge on, remarkably well separated into the glow of ionized hydrogen and sulfur atoms shown in red and green, and oxygen in blue hues. The segment visible in this photo is sometimes referred to as the Western Veil Nebula and is about 1/2 of the entire formation. Data Captured over 5 nights between Oct 30 and Nov 15, 2022 at my personally owned observatory located in Animas, NM.
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