ESO 593-8

ESO 593-8, which is known simply as 'The Bird' (also ESO 593-IG 008 or IRAS 19115–212) is group of interacting galaxies located in the constellation of Sagittarius, 650 million light-years away from Earth.^[3] It was created by a merger of two spiral galaxies and an irregular dwarf-galaxy.^[4] The resulting galaxy has a size similar to the Milky Way: around 100,000 light years.^[5] The galaxies were imaged by the Hubble Space Telescope and released in April 2008. The European Southern Observatory has also used the Very Large Telescope to resolve fine details of the galaxy with the use of adaptive optics.^[6]

ESO 593-8
HST image of ESO 593-8
Observation data (J2000 epoch)
Constellation	Sagittarius
Right ascension	19h 14m 31.135s[1]
Declination	−21° 19′ 09.00″[1]
Redshift	0.048727[2]
Heliocentric radial velocity	14252 km/s[2]
Distance	650 Mly (200 Mpc)[3]
Other designations
The Bird, PGC 62946[2]

References

1. Skrutskie, Michael F.; Cutri, Roc M.; Stiening, Rae; Weinberg, Martin D.; Schneider, Stephen E.; Carpenter, John M.; Beichman, Charles A.; Capps, Richard W.; Chester, Thomas; Elias, Jonathan H.; Huchra, John P.; Liebert, James W.; Lonsdale, Carol J.; Monet, David G.; Price, Stephan; Seitzer, Patrick; Jarrett, Thomas H.; Kirkpatrick, J. Davy; Gizis, John E.; Howard, Elizabeth V.; Evans, Tracey E.; Fowler, John W.; Fullmer, Linda; Hurt, Robert L.; Light, Robert M.; Kopan, Eugene L.; Marsh, Kenneth A.; McCallon, Howard L.; Tam, Robert; Van Dyk, Schuyler D.; Wheelock, Sherry L. (1 February 2006). "The Two Micron All Sky Survey (2MASS)". The Astronomical Journal. 131 (2): 1163–1183. Bibcode:2006AJ....131.1163S. doi:10.1086/498708. ISSN 0004-6256. S2CID 18913331.
2. "ESO 593-8". SIMBAD. Centre de données astronomiques de Strasbourg. Retrieved 2021-04-29.
3. "ESO 593-IG – The Bird". Futurism. Retrieved 2021-03-16.
4. "It's a Bird! It's Tinker Bell! It'sThree Galaxies!". Universe Today. 2007-12-26. Retrieved 2021-03-16.
5. "Anatomy of a Bird - VLT's NACO instrument reveals a triple cosmic collision". www.eso.org. Retrieved 2021-03-16.
6. "ESA Science & Technology - ESO 593-8". sci.esa.int. Retrieved 2021-03-16.