The Leo Galaxy Triplet on 02-14-2023

The Leo Triplet

Three interacting Spiral Galaxies in one FOV, also called the M66 group.

A favorite amongst both visual observers and Astro-Imagers.

The Leo Triplet is a small bright group of galaxies about 35 million light-years away in the constellation Leo.

This galaxy group consists of the spiral galaxies M65(top), M66, and the edge on NGC 3628 (aka The Hamburger Galaxy).

Although I have imaged these galaxies many times in the past with various sized telescopes, it always fun to see and image them each year.

I captured this image on 2-14-2023 at my observatories at JBSPO in Yellow Springs, Ohio with a 5.5 Newtonian reflector telescope,

Celestron AVX Mount, controlled with an ASI Air Plus,

ZWO 294MC cooled Cmos Camera, L-Pro Filter, Wi-Fi to IPAD, Processed in DSS, Pixinsight, and Adobe Raw CC 2023.

(30 x 2 minute subs) 60 minutes total integration time.