20 Feb
2004
20 Feb
'04
9:21 p.m.
From S&T's Weekly News Bulletin: A COSMIC GAME OF PEEKABOO Amateur astronomer Jay McNeil's January 23rd discovery of a newborn nebula near Messier 78 is proving to be even more intriguing than first thought. John Welch of Phoenix, Arizona, noticed that McNeil's Nebula actually appeared once before -- in an old Sky Publishing title, THE MESSIER ALBUM by John H. Mallas and Evered Kreimer (1978). That book contained a 15-minute white-light image taken by Kreimer on October 22, 1966, which was first published in SKY & TELESCOPE in January 1970 (page 27). From images obtained from the S&T archives, it now seems that this nebula has been playing peekaboo for quite some time....