{"id":309676,"date":"2026-02-21T10:37:06","date_gmt":"2026-02-21T10:37:06","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/309676\/"},"modified":"2026-02-21T10:37:06","modified_gmt":"2026-02-21T10:37:06","slug":"the-sky-today-on-saturday-february-21-a-ghostly-planetary-nebula","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/309676\/","title":{"rendered":"The Sky Today on Saturday, February 21: A ghostly planetary nebula"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>\t\t\tBack to Article List\t\t<\/p>\n<p>\n\t\t\t\tPlanetary nebula NGC 3242 in Hydra is popularly known as the Ghost of Jupiter. You\u2019ll find this glowing ball of gas in the sky late tonight.\t\t\t<\/p>\n<p><\/p>\n<p>\t\t\t\t<img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"600\" height=\"600\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/02\/ghosthunt57.jpg\" class=\"attachment-large size-large wp-post-image\" alt=\"\"\/><\/p>\n<p>\n\t\t\t\t\t\tThe Ghost of Jupiter (NGC 3242) has the perfect name for an object on the Ghost Hunt. This planetary nebula sits in west-central Hydra about 35\u00b0 south of Leo the Lion. At low magnification through a 6-inch telescope, you&#8217;ll see NGC 3242&#8217;s pale blue-green disk. Through larger scopes, and at powers above 200x, the interior appears like an eye or a football. Credit: Adam Block\/NOAO\/AURA\/NSF\t\t\t\t\t<\/p>\n<p class=\"has-text-align-center\">Looking for a sky event this week? Check out our full\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.astronomy.com\/observing\/the-sky-this-week-from-february-20-to-27-2026\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Sky This Week<\/a>\u00a0column.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p class=\"has-text-align-center\">February 20: <a href=\"https:\/\/www.astronomy.com\/observing\/the-sky-today-friday-february-20-2026\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">The Coma Star Cluster shines<\/a><\/p>\n<p>Head out after moonset this evening to chase down planetary nebula NGC 3242 in Hydra. Popularly called the Ghost of Jupiter, this ball of softly glowing gas appears roughly as large on the sky as the disk of Jupiter through a telescope, which is how it earned the nickname.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>Glowing at magnitude 7.7, NGC 3242 is about 30\u00b0 high in the south around 11 P.M. local time. The nearest bright star is 4th-magnitude Mu Hydrae, which shines just less than 2\u00b0 north of the nebula. Once you\u2019re centered on the nebula\u2019s position, you should see a ghostly orb glowing a pale blue \u2014 perhaps more reminiscent of Uranus or Neptune, but much larger than either of these planets in the eyepiece. Spanning about 16\u2033 visually through most scopes, see if you can notice how the innermost 10\u201d or so of the nebula are hollower (darker) than the outer regions. An Oxygen-III filter can help enhance the view.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>Sunrise:\u00a06:45 A.M.<br \/>Sunset:\u00a05:43 P.M.<br \/>Moonrise:\u00a08:35 A.M.<br \/>Moonset:\u00a010:46 P.M.<br \/>Moon Phase:\u00a0Waxing crescent (24%)<br \/>*Times for sunrise, sunset, moonrise, and moonset are given in local time from 40\u00b0 N 90\u00b0 W. The Moon\u2019s illumination is given at 10 P.M. local time from the same location.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Back to Article List Planetary nebula NGC 3242 in Hydra is popularly known as the Ghost of Jupiter.&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":309677,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[7],"tags":[61,60,7882,82,44123],"class_list":{"0":"post-309676","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-science","8":"tag-ie","9":"tag-ireland","10":"tag-observing","11":"tag-science","12":"tag-sky-tonight"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/309676","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=309676"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/309676\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/309677"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=309676"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=309676"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=309676"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}