Astronomy Picture of the Day
Discover the cosmos! Each day a different image or photograph of our fascinating universe is featured, along with a brief explanation written by a professional astronomer.
2016 October 13 
Posted on 10/13/2016 10:19:54 AM PDT by ThomasMore
Discover the cosmos! Each day a different image or photograph of our fascinating universe is featured, along with a brief explanation written by a professional astronomer.
2016 October 13
Explanation: The central bulge of our Milky Way Galaxy rises over the northern Chilean Atacama altiplano in this postcard from planet Earth. At an altitude of 4500 meters, the strange beauty of the desolate landscape could almost belong to another world though. Brownish red and yellow tinted sulfuric patches lie along the whitish salt flat beaches of the Salar de Aguas Calientes region. In the distance along the Argentina border is the stratovolcano Lastarria, its peak at 5700 meters (19,000 feet). In the clear, dark sky above, stars, nebulae, and cosmic dust clouds in the Milky Way echo the colors of the altiplano at night. Extending the view across extragalactic space, the Large and Small Magellanic Clouds, satellite galaxies of the Milky Way, shine near the horizon through a faint greenish airglow.
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These posts inspired me to get an app that sets the homescreen on my phone to the APOD, its great, thanks!
The earth’s orbit must be about 45° to the galactic plane.............
There is a reason the Andes in Chile are major sites for big telescopes. The Alto Plano might be one of the best places to sky watch as the air is very dry, altitude, and middle of nowhere.
Or vice versa.
While not as nice as the Scorpio-Sagittarius shot from a few months ago, it’s VERY cool.
The hole in the dark clouds in Centaurus/Crux is particularly impressive.
I just looked it up and Goooogle said it was 60°, not 45°.
Since the Altiplano pic is in Chile, the apparent angle must be skewed 15° or so.............
Since they didn’t give us any orientation, You have Sagittarius on the far left, then Scorpius, then Centaurus with the two bright stars in the center being first Beta Cent on the left and then Alpha Cent on the right. Crux is next with the Coal Sack. The big red and white cloud to the right of that is Eta Carina. Probably the next Supernova for us to see.
I prefer traditiplano to altiplano.
Assuming up is north on earth, we arent near the solstice but are still at a good seasonal angle to our solar plane and its compounded by that telescope almost being in outer space... Then there are those other 2 galexies out there that are at totally independant angles themselves......
We don’t know what time of year this was taken. The telescope is at 23° South of the equator............
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