NGC/IC Project Restoration Effort

===== NGC 5643 24" (4/11/08 - Magellan Observatory, Australia): at 260x I was very impressed with this large, bright barred spiral. The halo is slightly elongated, ~3.5'x3.0' and sharply concentrated with a very bright, small, core. Extending through the center is a brighter bar oriented E-W with a star superimposed on this bar to the west of the core. A second superimposed star lies 35" to the south and continuing on this line is a third star just at the edge of the halo, 1.7' S of center. At the east end of the bar a slightly enhanced arc sweeps clockwise to the north and a similar enhancement on the west side sweeps to the south. The faint arc or arms wrap around 180¡ making a complete outer ring. The central bar and the outer ring together form the Greek letter "theta". Situated in a fairly rich Lupus star field. 18" (7/5/05 - Magellan Observatory, Australia): fascinating glimpses of structure at 228x! This galaxy is fairly bright and large, round, ~3.5' diameter. The surface brightness is clearly patchy in the halo due to the strong impression of clockwise spiral structure but there was only a broad, weak concentration in the center except for a sharply concentrated, bright 15" nucleus. A broad spiral arm is attached on the east side of the galaxy shooting sharply to the north. There is an impression of another spiral arm attached on the west side of the galaxy and sweeping towards the south in a clockwise orientation, though this structure is not as well defined. A string of five stars angling SSE to NNW appear to puncture the galaxy on the south side with the northern two stars superimposed on the west side of the galaxy with the last star in the chain just west of the nucleus. Located in a star field densely peppered with stars. 13.1" (4/10/86): faint, diffuse, fairly small. Two stars are superimposed on the south and SW side.