A new star in the sky

A NEW STAR IN THE SKY

 Around the world, amateur astronomers are turning their telescopes toward minor constellation Delphinus where a new star has appeared. Koichi Itagaki of Yamagata, Japan, discovered the nova on August 14th. At the time, the stellar brightness was +6.3. Since then it has continued to brighten, possibly crossing the 6th magnitude threshold of naked-eye visibility. John Chumack photographed the surging nova on August 15th from the John Bryan State Park in Yellow Springs, Ohio:

 

 

"The nova is hard to see naked eye unless you are in a very dark sky and know exactly where to look," says Chumack, "but this is a very bright nova visible in binoculars." He used a 16-inch Newtonian telescope to take the picture.

Backyard astronomers who wish to see this nova should point their GOTO telescopes to coordinates 20:23:30.7, +20:46:06 (J2000). More information and updates are available from Sky and Telescope.