Combination of 10, 3 minute exposures, SBIG ST9XE CCD camera.
300mm f/6 newtonian telescope at prime focus.
NGC 6872 is a bright interacting spiral galaxy in far southern Pavo. The spiral arms are very open and one is highly distorted due to the close passage of another galaxy. In 2004, A spectacular image of this system was released by the Hubble Space Telescope Institute. NGC 6872 is a member of a small cluster of galaxies centred on the giant elleptical galaxy, NGC 6876, which is the brightest galaxy in the image. The bright edge-on galaxy to the left of NGC 6876 is NGC 6880. All of these three galaxies are easily visible in an 8" telescope in the same field. Numerous other IC and PGC galaxies are visible in the image. The magnitudes of these vary between 15 and 17 and so make interesting challenges for visual observers.
