North America and Pelican Nebula

Designation: NGC 7000 (North America) – IC 5070 (Pelican)
Hemisphere: Northern
Constellation: Cygnus
Distance: 2,600 ly (North America) – 1,800 ly (Pelican)
Object type: H II region

Description

NGC 7000 is a large emission nebula located some 2,600 light years from Earth, in the constellation Cygnus, in the star Deneb’s neighbourhood. It’s informally known as the North America Nebula due to its incredible resemblance in shape to that of the continent of North America, including the Gulf of Mexico.

The region equivalent to the area between Mexico and Central America is known as the Cygnus Wall, the area of the nebula with the highest star formation rate. The entire nebula covers an area more than ten times that of a full moon.

Associated with the North America Nebula is the Pelican Nebula, a H II region shaped like the water bird from which takes the name. The two are separated by a dark molecular cloud and are part of the same interstellar cloud of ionized hydrogen.

Located around 1,800 light years from us, the Pelican Nebula presents an active mix of young star formation and evolving gas clouds, which will eventually change the nebula’s look millions of years from now.

In this image I captured the low emission nebula IC 5068, and the star clusters NGC 6997, NGC 6989 and NGC 6996. They are highlighted in the image below.

Equipment

Mount: ZWO AM5
Main Telescope: William Optics Redcat 51
Main camera: ZWO ASI294MC-Pro
Main camera filter: IDAS NBZ Dual Band
Guidescope: Svbony SV165 30/120
Guide camera: ZWO ASI120MM-S
Guide camera filter: Astronomik UV/IR cut

Acquisition details

Total integration time: 10 hours 30 minutes
Acquisition: ZWO AsiAir Plus
Processing: PixInsight
Location: Luxembourg