Steve’s Virtual Planet

Orion, The Hunter - Part One

For this first installment of “The Constellations” series, I am going take the opportunity to begin with perhaps my favorite of them all, Orion.

Orion is one of most recognizable star patterns in the sky and is often depicted as a male human figure, for example, The Hunter. The Greek mythology concerning Orion is the one most well known in modern time, however, peoples all over the world have invented all manner of stories about this prominent constellation. For at least 50 centuries cultures have been known to idolize this god like character in their myths and legends.

As fascinating as these eons of myths are, the stars, clusters and deep sky objects within Orion are truly the highlight of this wonderful constellation. Many of these features are easy to locate and study through a modest size telescope. Even in a suburban sky, one can see 8 stars bright enough to peep through the typical sky pollution of a big city. Some objects are even more impressive through binoculars for a wider field of view. The Orion Nebula, for example, is the main feature that reveals more and more detail as you view with increasing magnification.

The most well known and studied objects in Orion are between about 240 to around 1500 light years from Earth, part of the Milky Way. These primary targets that we see in the constellation reside in the same spiral arm of the galaxy, which is where our own Solar System is found. This concentration of stars is known as the Orion-Cygnus Arm. At this relatively close distance, Orion’s stars and nebula are truly in our cosmic neighborhood.

Check out the links above as there is a wealth of information and history related to Orion. Look for more additions on Orion as part of the series “The Constellations”. I will be exploring the key objects already mentioned and describing binocular and telescope views for suburban and country skies.