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public  Greenwich, UK Greenwich, UK  ⓘ
TimezoneEurope/London
Sunrise: 7:00 
Transit: 11:43 
Sunset: 16:26
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All Constellations »  Orion »  Deep Sky Objects » 

NGC 1981 (Upper Sword) - Star Cluster + Nebula in Orion

Below the horizon.  Rise: 21:01 | Tran: 2:41 | Set: 8:16
Alt: -22.06°   Az: 292.07°   Direction: West-North-West

NGC 1981 is a Star Cluster + Nebula in the Orion constellation. NGC 1981 is situated close to the celestial equator and, as such, it is at least partly visible from both hemispheres in certain times of the year. Given its visual magnitude of 4.2, NGC 1981 is barely visible to the naked eye, easily visible with the help of a small binocular.

The image below is a photograph of NGC 1981 from the Digitized Sky Survey 2 (DSS2 - see the credits section) taken in the red channel. The area of sky represented in the image is 0.5000x0.5000 degrees (30.00x30.00 arcmins).

Image of NGC 1981 (Upper Sword) - Star Cluster + Nebula in Orion star
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DSS2 image of NGC 1981 in the Red band. The green region on the image is a representation of the major (9 arcmin) and minor (9 arcmin) axes of the object's apparent size.

Celestial Coordinates

Apparent

05h 36m 23s
-04° 24’ 37”
08h 02m 05s
13h 38m 28s

J2000

05h 35m 09s
-04° 25’ 29”

Finder Chart

The simplified sky charts below show the position of NGC 1981 in the sky. The first chart has a field of view of 60° while the second one has a field of view of 10°.

Finder chart NGC 1981 (Upper Sword) - Star Cluster + Nebula in Orion star
Simplified finder chart for NGC 1981 (Upper Sword) - Star Cluster + Nebula in Orion.

Finder chart NGC 1981 (Upper Sword) - Star Cluster + Nebula in Orion star
Simplified finder chart for NGC 1981 (Upper Sword) - Star Cluster + Nebula in Orion.

Photometric Information

The following table lists the magnitude of NGC 1981 in different bands of the electomagnetic spectrum (when available), from the B band (445nm wavelength, corresponding to the Blue color), to the V band ( 551nm wavelength, corresponding to Green/Yellow color), to the J, H, K bands (corresponding to 1220nm, 1630nm, 2190nm wavelengths respectively, which are colors not visible to the human eye).

4.2

For more information about photometry in astronomy, check the photometric system article on Wikipedia.

Apparent Size

The following table reports NGC 1981 apparent angular size. The green area displayed on top of the DSS2 image of NGC 1981 is a visual representation of it.
9 arcmin
9 arcmin

Rise and Set Times

Location: Greenwich, UK
Latitude: 51° 28’ 47” N
Longitude: 0° 00’ 00” E
Timezone: Europe/London

Today's NGC 1981 (Upper Sword) - Star Cluster + Nebula in Orion rise, transit and set times from Greenwich, UK are the following (all times relative to the local timezone Europe/London):

Azimuth: 94.4°
Max altitude: 34.1°
Azimuth: 265.6°