#caldwell 12

[quiltofstars]

The Fireworks Galaxy (C12, left) and NGC 6939 (lower right) // jro_rm

The Fireworks Galaxy is another circumpolar object, so it'll be up all year round for northern hemisphere observers. However, it is best viewed in the late summer. Observers will be rewarded as well with another object, the open cluster NGC 6939, which is much closer to home than the Fireworks Galaxy.

[quiltofstars]

The Fireworks Galaxy, C12 // Anthony Grillo

Another often featured object is the Fireworks Galaxy (NGC 6946), a spiral galaxy located about 25 million light years away on the border of Cepheus, the King, and Cygnus, the Swan.

Discovered in 1798 by William Herschel (1738-1822), the Fireworks Galaxy has a diameter of about 87,300 light years. Compare that to our Galaxy's 100,000 light year diameter.

[quiltofstars]

The Fireworks Galaxy, C12 // Sven Wischmann

This galaxy is hard to see since it lies behind the dark dust lane that marks out the equator in our Galaxy, but when you see it, it's amazing! It's named the "Fireworks Galaxy" because 10 supernovae have been observed here in the 20th and 21st centuries alone! This is about 10 times the rate of our own Galaxy, even though the Milky Way has about twice as many stars as NGC 6946.

The most recent supernova in this galaxy happened in May 2017, named SN 2017eaw. Investigations determined that it was a red supergiant star with a mass of about 15 times that of the Sun that exploded.

[spacettf]

Fireworks for the 4th by Joshua Bury on Flickr.

Via Flickr: The Fireworks Galaxy is a large (but relatively faint) galaxy in Cygnus. So named because of the large number of supernovae that have been observed coming from this member of our local galactic neighborhood (it's only about 10 million light years away)