Shakedown Cruise Complete
15 Apr 2017Robert Phillips
Having stopped in the Dumbbell Nebula for a while, it was time to move on and continue ferrying my passengers and get them back home to Chicomoztoc.My tour continues to 2 more nearby nebulae, before returning home.
On the way, I stopped into HD 235316, a hot blue 'O' type star. O-type str systems often have something of interest in them due to their large mass capturing many high mass bodies in their orbits. This system was no exception as it had a ringed brown dwarf star in it's orbit, with a landable lifeless planet nearby. When positioned just right, you are afforded some beautiful views of contrasting blue and red:
My main destination here is the NGC 7822 nebula, followed by the LBN 623 nebula. As I headed in that direction, I stopped briefly to photograph a ternary star system of hot blue/white stars at NGC 7822 Sector FG-Y e3:
And then moved on to the NGC 7822 nebula:
Since NGC 7822 is nothing to write home about, I didn't stay there long. I targeted LBN 623, and found a small system with *A LOT* of stars. Outopps HI-B d13-3 has 4 pairs of binary stars making it an Octonary system. The best thing is that all the stars are within a few hundred LS of each other, allowing you to see them all at once quite clearly:
And so, after a bit of sunbathing, it was time to arrive at LBN 623 - a unique purple nebula with a distinctive shape. Well worth checking out:
My passengers were getting restless, so I took them back home, thus completing The Millennium Dustbin's shakedown cruise. All systems checked out nicely, so with just a few minor tweaks to the system build, it was time to head off on a new long-range exploration expedition...