Astronomy Picture of the Day -- The Summer Triangle Over Catalonia

NASA ^ | August 10, 2011 | (see photo credit)

[SunkenCiv]

Explanation: Can you find the Summer Triangle? It's not hard to find this famous triangle of stars this time of year from northern locations. Just look straight up after sunset and find three of the brightest stars in the sky that nearly form a triangle. Then compare these stars to sky images like the one shown above, or hold up a smart phone running a good sky labelling application. The three stars that form the vertexes of the Summer Triangle are Vega, Deneb, and Altair. Pictured above is a 360 degree full sky projection framing not only the Summer Triangle but the great arch of our Milky Way Galaxy. The image was taken last week in front of a small river that encircles the historic town of Sant Llorenç de la Muga in Catalonia, northeastern Spain.

[SunkenCiv]

[Credit & Copyright: Juan Carlos Casado (TWAN)]

[SunkenCiv]

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[WayneS]

Just look straight up after sunset and find three of the brightest stars in the sky that nearly form a triangle [emphasis mine]

This seems strange terminology for a report on astronomy (a science which presumably involves a knowledge of mathematics and geometry).

Three non-coincident points do not 'nearly' form a triangle, they form a triangle. It may not be an equilateral triangle, but it will always be a triangle of some sort.

[spankalib]

Thanks for posting these pictures, I ALWAYS click on APOD, though I don’t always comment :)

One of my favorite constellations can be seen now, side-lying on the eastern horizon in the early morning...the harbinger of winter; Orion.
Cheers!

[brytlea]

Orion’s Belt is one of the few I can actually find! :)

[brytlea]

You would be correct. Even a non mathy person like me understands that.

[brytlea]

Beautiful!

[TheOldLady]

Ah, the Summer Triangle. My first effort to find out the names of stars.

I spent a lot of time gazing up at them during summer evenings on vacation from high school.

Cloudy evenings were rare in the San Gabriel Valley in Southern California (it is in the desert), so the stars were always there for me to watch and dream about the wide world and my whole life ahead of me.

[DeoVindiceSicSemperTyrannis]

Beautiful.