Hubble turns 16

Happy birthday dear friend. Oh how thee have long brought the world fantastic images of unforeseen places. How thee have advanced knowledge of scientists and explorers around the world. Oh how it is too sad that you will be decommissioned in 2007 due to Bush's push to return to the moon. We will miss thee.

OK, enough of that. On to this:

To celebrate the NASA-ESA Hubble Space Telescope’s 16 years of success, the two space agencies are releasing a mosaic image of the magnificent starburst galaxy, Messier 82 (M82). It is the sharpest wide-angle view ever obtained of M82, a galaxy remarkable for its webs of shredded clouds and flame-like plumes of glowing hydrogen blasting out from its central regions.
Located 12 million light-years away, M82 appears high in the northern spring sky in the direction of the constellation Ursa Major, the Great Bear. It is also called the "Cigar Galaxy" because of the elongated elliptical shape produced by the tilt of its starry disk relative to our line of sight.

See the top 25 images taken by the Hubble here.

Posted in: Bush, Hubble Space Telescope