The sky around vdB 124 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.
vdB 124 is a reflection nebula in Scutum, 739 light-years away
vdB 124 (IC 1287, LBN 75, Ced 163) is a reflection nebula in the constellation Scutum, 739 light-years away. spans 20′ of sky, about 4.3 light-years across. It is a telescope object, 6 inches or larger, and it is highest in the evening sky in August.
Nebula: a cloud of gas and dust. Emission nebulae glow on their own, lit by ultraviolet light from hot young stars; reflection nebulae shine by starlight scattered from dust; dark nebulae block the light behind them.
vdB 124 is vdB 124 in the Van den Bergh catalog of reflection nebulae
Sidney van den Bergh listed it in his catalog of reflection nebulae (1966), drawn from the Palomar Sky Survey. He chose nebulae lit by a star bright enough to appear in the Bonner and Cordoba star catalogs. The star that lights it is HD 170740, B2V, magnitude 5.8. He rated it bright in brightness and very blue in color.
Finding vdB 124 from Sinistra
vdB 124 lies 8.0° east of Sinistra, the magnitude 3.3 star. A fist held at arm's length covers about 10°.
vdB 124 is highest in the evening in August
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 79°N, and never sets south of 79°S.
vdB 124 is 739 light-years away
The light seen from vdB 124 tonight left it about 739 years ago, around 1287 AD. It ranks 30 of 158 by distance among the Van den Bergh nebulae. Distance source: Gaia DR3 parallax of the illuminating star via AT-HYG v3.2 (226 pc).
