The sky around vdB 109 at true scale, north up and east left, with stars to magnitude 8. The circles show the field of a low-power eyepiece and of 10×50 binoculars.
vdB 109 is a reflection nebula in Ophiuchus, 385 light-years away
vdB 109 (LBN 5) is a reflection nebula in the constellation Ophiuchus, 385 light-years away. spans 36′ of sky, about 4.0 light-years across. It is a telescope object, 6 inches or larger, and it is highest in the evening sky in July.
Nebula: a cloud of gas and dust. Emission nebulae glow on their own, lit by ultraviolet light from hot young stars; reflection nebulae shine by starlight scattered from dust; dark nebulae block the light behind them.
vdB 109 is vdB 109 in the Van den Bergh catalog of reflection nebulae
Sidney van den Bergh listed it in his catalog of reflection nebulae (1966), drawn from the Palomar Sky Survey. He chose nebulae lit by a star bright enough to appear in the Bonner and Cordoba star catalogs. The star that lights it is HD 150416, G7.5IICN1Ba0.4, magnitude 4.9. He rated it very faint in brightness and moderately red in color.
Finding vdB 109 from Antares
vdB 109 lies 9.1° north of Antares, the magnitude 1.1 star. A fist held at arm's length covers about 10°.
vdB 109 is highest in the evening in July
The chart gives its height above the horizon at 9 pm through the year, from 60°N to 40°S. It can be seen from the whole southern hemisphere and north to about 72°N, and never sets south of 72°S.
vdB 109 is 385 light-years away
The light seen from vdB 109 tonight left it about 385 years ago, around 1641 AD. It ranks 3 of 158 by distance among the Van den Bergh nebulae. Distance source: Gaia DR3 parallax of the illuminating star via AT-HYG v3.2 (118 pc).
