The Veil Nebula is the wispy wreckage of a supernova that exploded some eight thousand years ago. Here we see Pickering’s Triangle, yet another portion of the Veil complex, which is located between the east and west portions that we saw previously.
Pickering’s Triangle (45 min total exposure Oct 31, 2021)
Pickering’s Triangle is a tangle of wormy filaments and vacant holes that narrows into a bright goatee of sorts. It is much fainter than the Eastern Veil and the Western Veil.
Pickering’s Triangle wasn’t discovered until it was found photographically in 1904 by Williamina Fleming. However, as was customary at the time, her observatory director, Edward Charles Pickering, was credited with the discovery. Since it had not yet been discovered when the NGC catalog was created, it has no NGC number although some sources refer to it as NGC 6764 or NGC 6769. You will notice another small patch of the Veil just below Pickering’s Triangle in this image.
I had taken some images of the Veil last year but was not happy enough with them to share in this blog. Recent longer and less hazy nights allowed me to take some considerably longer exposure images to capture more detail. This is another one of those.