The open star cluster NGC 6530 (mag 4.6), close to the lagoon nebula (M8) in Sagittarius will be well placed, high in the sky. It will reach its highest point in the sky at around midnight local time.
At a declination of -24°21', it is easiest to see from the southern hemisphere but cannot be seen from latitudes much north of 45°N.
From Fairfield, it will be visible between 22:48 and 02:44. It will become accessible around 22:48, when it rises to an altitude of 19° above your south-eastern horizon. It will reach its highest point in the sky at 00:48, 24° above your southern horizon. It will become inaccessible around 02:44 when it sinks below 19° above your south-western horizon.
At magnitude 4.6, NGC6530 is too faint to be seen with the naked eye from any but the very darkest sites, but is visible through a pair of binoculars or small telescope.
The position of NGC6530 is as follows:
Object | Right Ascension | Declination | Constellation | Magnitude | Angular Size |
NGC6530 | 18h04m30s | -24°21' | Sagittarius | 4.6 | 15'00" |
The coordinates above are given in J2000.0.
The sky on 24 June 2021 | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
99% 14 days old |
All times shown in EDT.
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Source
The circumstances of this event were computed using the DE430 planetary ephemeris published by the Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL).
This event was automatically generated by searching the ephemeris for planetary alignments which are of interest to amateur astronomers, and the text above was generated based on an estimate of your location.
Image credit
© Digitised Sky Survey (DSS); Second Palomar Observatory Sky Survey (POSS-II)