BASUDEB CHAKRABARTI
Location: Heaven’s Mirror Observatory, Australia
Telescope: Takahashi FSQ-106ED “The Lagoon and Trifid Nebula are a giant interstellar cloud in the northwest of Sagittarius in a star-forming region of the Milky Way’s Scutum-Centaurus Arm. The Lagoon Nebula is estimated to be between 4,000 and 6,000 light years from Earth. In the sky of Earth, it spans 90 by 40 arcminutes, which translates to an actual dimension of 110 by 50 light years. The nebula contains a number of Bok globules. The Lagoon Nebula also contains at its centre a structure known as the Hourglass Nebula. The Trifid Nebula is an unusual combination of an open cluster of stars, an emission nebula, reflection nebula and dark nebula.”