The sky around NGC 3309 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 3309 is an elliptical galaxy (E) in Hydra, 169 million light-years away
NGC 3309 (ESO 501-036, PGC 31466) is an elliptical galaxy (E) in the constellation Hydra, 169 million light-years away. It shines at magnitude 11.7 and spans 1.8′ × 1.6′ of sky, about 88,300 light-years across. It is a telescope object, 6 inches or larger, and it is highest in the evening sky in April.
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.
Finding NGC 3309 from ν Hya
NGC 3309 lies 11.7° south of ν Hya, the magnitude 3.1 star. A fist held at arm's length covers about 10°.
NGC 3309 is highest in the evening in April
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 62°N, and never sets south of 62°S.
NGC 3309 is 169 million light-years away
The light seen from NGC 3309 tonight left it about 169 million years ago, long before modern humans existed. It ranks 285 of 422 by distance among the galaxies on Go Astronomy. Distance source: Cosmicflows-4 (Tully et al. 2023), Fundamental Plane.
Objects within 6° of NGC 3309
No other Messier, Caldwell or Herschel 400 object lies within 6°.
