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Birthday · May 26, 2020

The Milky Way over Snow-Capped Himalayas

May 26, 2020

The constellations may be old, but the person celebrating beneath them is gloriously new by cosmic standards.

The Milky Way over Snow-Capped Himalayas

A little universe, just for you

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APOD published May 26, 2020. Credit: Tomas Havel. A publication-date match, not a photo taken on your date. Independent of NASA.

Behind the image

The Milky Way over Snow-Capped Himalayas

Original APOD · May 26, 2020

What’s higher than the Himalayas? Although the Himalayan Mountains are the tallest on planet Earth, they don't measure up to the Milky Way. Visible above the snow-capped mountains in the featured image is the arcing central band of our home galaxy. The bright spot just above the central plane is the planet Jupiter, while the brightest orange spot on the upper right is the star Antares. The astrophotographer braved below-zero temperatures at nearly 4,000-meters altitude to take the photographs that compose this image. The featured picture is a composite of eight exposures taken with same camera and from the same location over three hours, just after sunset, in 2019 April, from near Bimtang Lake in Nepal. Over much of planet Earth, the planets Mercury (faint) and Venus (bright) will be visible this week after sunset. Experts Debate: How will humanity first discover extraterrestrial life?

Image credit: Tomas Havel

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