The Open Cluster Messier 7

This is not really a popular target, but the young star cluster Messier 7 (M7), in the constellation of Scorpius, offers stunning view of the central areas of our galaxy, with countless stars and complex dark nebulae all together... The cluster itself is the group of a few tens of brighter stars spread all over an extended area around the centre of this view. The picture has been taken in the Full Moon night... but in the middle of the total phase of a lunar eclipse, hence in a conveniently dark sky !

Photo: Cristian Valenzuela / Observatorio del Pangue - May, 15th, 2022
North is up

Every year has its bright supernova...

Indeed, supernovae in distant galaxies are rather common, but bright supernovae involved with a Messier galaxy are quite rare. A few weeks ago we've been granted with SN2022hrs, a type 1a supernova appeared on the border of NGC4647, a small galaxy adjacent to the large and bright M60, both galaxies lying some 60 million light-years away, in the constellation of Virgo.

The picture below shows this pair (M60 is the larger one), with the supernova appearing just in between as a tiny white dot very close to the nucleus of NGC4647. We captured it precisely when it peaked in brightness, reaching the remarquable magnitude of 12.4.

Incidentally, we can note that the spiral galaxy NGC4647 shows much more structures than the elliptical M60... Furthermore, the small elongated smudge at the lower right corner of the field is the galaxy NGC4638.

Photos: Cristian Valenzuela / Observatorio del Pangue - April 28th, 2022
Canon 60D at prime focus of SCT Meade LX200 16" reduced at f/6, ISO 4000, total exposure 25 minutes. North is up.