Mag 8.00 galaxy in Hydrus
RA 13h 37.376m
Dec -29° 54.168'
Date - 2000hr AEST 16 Aug 2006
Location - Newcastle, Australia
Telescope - 200mm f/6 GSO Dobsonian
EP - 20mm Televue Plossl
From this relatively light polluted location, albeit darker than it often is - I didn't expect to find very much of M83 - and I didn't!
I starhopped to M83 from mu- and nu- Centauri, across to the four star asterism of 1-, 2-, 3- and 4- Centauri, and then dropped about 4deg down to the area of M83. At this time it was at an altitude of 37° in the west.
Nothing of M83 was visible in the 8*50 finderscope.
In the 20mm Plossl, M83 initially appeared as an approx 7-8th magnitude star, which quickly became "fuzzy" on closer examination - closer scrutiny revealed a brighter fuzzy patch a couple of arc minutes across, and the VERY faint hint of a fuzzy area maybe 10 arc minutes across - gentle nudging of the OTA confirmed this, as did a closer look through the XW-10.
Subsequent review of Starry Night Pro confirmed the sketch taken as M83.
Certainly nothing like the awesome images of this galaxy posted regularly - but visible notheless from my suburban backyard.
I hope to follow-up this report with a dark sky report of M83 this weekend - fingers crossed!
One of the many great images of M83 - by tonado33
http://www.iceinspace.com.au/forum/s...ad.php?t=12449
Check
http://www.seds.org/messier/m/m083.html for a bunch of further info about this galaxy and its discovery.