Constellation Profile - Norma

The tour of the southern constellations continues with a stop over at Norma.  Even though it sounds like a female name it actually refers to a carpenter's square.  Lacaille continued to use enlightenment lab equipment to represent his sky.  Unfortunately for residents of Calgary, Norma remains below the horizon throughout the entire year.  To find this constellation in the southern sky simply locate the two bright pointer stars, Alpha and Beta Centauri.  They will point to the other Lacaille constellation of Circinus.  Circinus the compass opens right onto Norma.  The constellation looks like a four-sided trapezoid that seems to sit underneath the tail of Scorpius.

Star-hop to Norma

As a key element of enlightenment architecture, Lacaille placed it up in the sky along with many other items.  An image from his original planisphere is shown below.

Lacaille Norma

The map was improved on half a century later by the astronomer Johann Bode.  His depiction of this region is below.  As you can see, the shape sits right below the tail of Scorpius.

Uranographia Norma

Norma has a plentiful supply of deep-sky objects as the Milky Way flows right through the middle.  The constellation even contains an arm of our galaxy known as the Norma Arm.  There are many open clusters that are visible through binoculars so it becomes a great region for casual observers.  I am certain if I were to travel south enough I would spend a lot of time here.

Norma also contains the Ant Nebula.  I have only seen a handful of astrophotographers image this beautiful looking nebula.  The image below is from the Hubble Space Telescope.

Ant Nebula (Image Credit: R. Sahai (JPL) Hubble Heritage Team)

Norma also contains the fastest spinning Magnetar (SGR J1550-5418).  An article about possible starquakes from this magnetar is presented below.  Although approximately 15,000 light years away it was felt by our own atmosphere.

https://www.nasa.gov/content/goddard/nasas-fermi-satellite-finds-hints-of-starquakes-in-magnetar-storm

The southern sky is full of wonders.  Each constellation has its own story to tell containing their own hidden treasures.  When I read stories of objects tens of thousands of light years away affecting Earth it makes me feel our own galactic neighbourhood is a little closer!