The Stars on Orion’s Belt
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The rainy Pleiads wester,
Orion plunges prone,
The stroke of midnight ceases,
And I lie down alone.
A. E. Housman
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Orion’s Belt and M42 (The Orion Nebula) |
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Forgive the reprise, but this diary continues our previous visit to Orion. I hope you find this interesting and informative.
This time we visit the 3 stars of the Belt of Orion and introduce The Orion Nebula. I’m starting this diary a bit late so the Nebula may be a diary on its own. None the less, here we go.
Orion, The Hunter, is a famous, easily recognizeable constellation located along the celestial equator which is visible from both the northern and southern hemispheres. In the northern hemisphere it is a winter constellation, visible in the night sky from November through February. The constellation contains 6 of the top 100 brightest stars in the sky. |
Mintaka (α Ori)
Mintaka is the seventh brightest of the stars in Orion. The furthest west and faintestof the three stars of Orion’s belt it is approximately 915 ly from Earth. Mintaka is a binary star system consisting of two very hot stars of about 20 solar masseseach. The large of the two is a type B star, the smaller a type O.1 These stars are about 70,000 times as luminous as the Sun |
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Section of a plate from Uranographia showing the constellation Orion
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