NGC 6946
Spiral Galaxy NGC 6946
(= H IV.76),
type Sc,
in Cepheus
Right Ascension |
20 : 34.8 (h:m)
|
Declination |
+60 : 09 (deg:m)
|
Distance |
10,000 (kly)
|
Visual Brightness |
8.9 (mag)
|
Apparent Dimension |
11 x 10 (arc min) |
Discovered by William Herschel in 1798.
8.9-mag NGC 6946 was discovered by
William Herschel on September 9, 1798.
NGC 6946 is a rather nearby spiral galaxy, which at one time was suspected
to be an outlying member of the
Local Group.
It is highly obscured by interstellar matter of the
Milky Way galaxy, as it is quite close to
the galactic plane.
Six supernovae have been detected in NGC 6946:
- SN 1917A
occurred on July 19, 1917 when it was discovered by Ritchey.
This supernova, situated 37"W and 105"S of the galaxy's nucleus, lightened
up to 14.6 mag.
- SN 1939C
was discovered by Fritz Zwicky on July 17, 1939 (see
IAU Circular No. 793),
215"W and 24"N of the galaxy's center, and peaked at 13.0 mag.
- SN 1948B
was found by Mayall when it flashed up on July 6, 1948, 222"E and
60"N of the galaxy's nucleus; it reached magnitude 14.9 (see
IAUC 1161)
- SN 1968D brightened up on February 29, 1968 the leap day, 45"E and
20"N of the galaxy's center, and became as bright as 13.5 mag. This supernova
was discovered by Wild and Dunlap, and was found to be of type II (see
IAUC 2057 and IAUC 6045)
- SN 1969P occurred on December 11, 1969, 5"W and 180"S of the nucleus
and reached mag 13.9. It was found by Rosino (see
IAUC 2305)
- SN 1980K was discovered by Wild on October 28, 1980 when it occurred
280"E and 166"S of the galaxy's center; it reached mag 11.4 (see
IAUC 3532 and AJ 111, 2017)
With this number of supernovae which have been found in this galaxy,
NGC 6946 is leading the statistics, perhaps together with
M83.
In the SAC 110 best NGC object list.
No. 108 in the RASC Finest NGC Objects list.
Caldwell 12 in Patrick Moore's list.
NED data of NGC 6946
SIMBAD Data of NGC 6946
Observing Reports for NGC 6946 (IAAC Netastrocatalog)
Hartmut Frommert
(spider@seds.org)
Christine Kronberg
(smil@lrz.uni-muenchen.de)
Last Modification: 29 Mar 1998, 12:20 MET