NGC 891

Some highlights for some binocular observing.

And if you're at a really dark sky, you might be able to see NGC 891 in your binoculars, though.

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It is a treat to image and observe.

Our next stop takes us back into the constellation Andromeda, where we'll find NGC 891, also known as Caldwell 23.

NGC 891 is also sometimes called the Outer Limits Galaxy, as an image of it was used in the closing credits of the classic 1960s sci-fi TV series, The Outer Limits.

Located roughly 30 million light years away, NGC 891 is a spiral galaxy that we see almost perfectly edge-on.

Unlike the broad spiral arms we've been exploring in our previous galaxies, here we're looking directly across the thin disk of a galaxy, giving it a long, narrow appearance.

To find it, start with the star Amok, or Gamma Andromedae, and look about 3.5 degrees east.

NGC 891 shines at around magnitude 1080. and stretches about 13 arcminutes across the sky.

But despite its relatively bright-listed magnitude, this is a challenging object from light-polluted locations.

Fair warning: one object is going to steal the show, but we're making it wait.

Not far from the border with Perseus is NGC 891, one of the finest edge-on galaxies in the autumn sky.

Through a telescope, it looks almost impossibly thin, a long sliver of light with a dark lane of dust cutting straight through the middle.

It's about 30 million light-years away and roughly 100,000 light-years across, which may sound familiar, because NGC 891 looks remarkably like the Milky Way might look if we could somehow leave our own galaxy, travel millions of light-years away, turn around, and look back: a flattened disc, a central bulge, a dark band of dust running through the middle.

Not an exact twin, but close enough to give us something we can never actually have: an outside view of something a lot like home.

And NGC 891 isn't quite as neat as it first appears.

Look closely and you'll find filaments of gas and dust reaching hundreds of light-years above and below the galactic disc.

The likely culprits are stars.