The sky around NGC 2397 at true scale, north up and east left, with stars to magnitude 8. The circles show the field of a low-power eyepiece and of 10×50 binoculars.
NGC 2397 is a barred spiral galaxy (SBb) in Volans, 70 million light-years away
NGC 2397 (ESO 058-030, PGC 20766) is a barred spiral galaxy (SBb) in the constellation Volans, 70 million light-years away. It shines at magnitude 12.0 and spans 2.5′ × 48″ of sky, about 51,300 light-years across. It is a telescope object, 6 inches or larger, and it is highest in the evening sky in February.
Galaxy: a system of billions of stars, gas and dust held together by gravity, far outside the Milky Way. Spiral galaxies have a disk with arms; elliptical galaxies are smooth, round or oval swarms of older stars.
NGC 2397 is AM 721-685 in the Arp-Madore catalog
Halton Arp and Barry Madore listed it in A Catalogue of Southern Peculiar Galaxies and Associations (1987), from their search of the UK Schmidt southern sky survey plates. The number 721-685 is its position: right ascension 7h 21m and declination -68.5°.
Finding NGC 2397 from Miaplacidus
NGC 2397 lies 9.8° west of Miaplacidus, the magnitude 1.7 star. A fist held at arm's length covers about 10°.
NGC 2397 is highest in the evening in February
The chart gives its height above the horizon at 9 pm through the year, from 60°N to 40°S. It can be seen from the whole southern hemisphere and north to about 21°N, and never sets south of 21°S.
NGC 2397 is 70 million light-years away
The light seen from NGC 2397 tonight left it about 70 million years ago, long before modern humans existed. It ranks 163 of 422 by distance among the galaxies on Go Astronomy. Distance source: Cosmicflows-4 (Tully et al. 2023), Tully-Fisher.
Objects within 6° of NGC 2397
No other Messier, Caldwell or Herschel 400 object lies within 6°.
