Centaurus A (NGC 5128)

A big round galaxy crossed by a dramatic dark band of dust.

Also called: NGC 5128.

🕒 When can I see it?🚀 Travel there

Centaurus A (NGC 5128) — Drawn, not photographed.

What it is

Strange elliptical galaxy sliced by a dark dust lane, evidence of swallowing a smaller spiral galaxy.

Elliptical galaxy: An old, round swarm with little gas left to make stars. Every kind of thing there is →

How to find Centaurus A

Look in the constellation Centaurus.

From the southern hemisphere, look in the autumn.

Best Apr-Jun; very low or never rises from mid-to-high northern latitudes.

Star-hop: Shows its dust lane in a 6-inch scope from southern or low-northern latitudes.

The Planetarium works out where it actually is from your own place and the date — including whether it is above the horizon at all tonight.

Show me Centaurus A in tonight's sky

What you will really see

With binoculars

Binoculars show it as a small, soft, grey patch. Not the photograph — and unlike the photograph, it is arriving in your eyes right now.

Through a small telescope, on a good night

A small round smudge of glow, brightest in the middle, with no detail.

🔭 See it drawn as it looks through a telescope

🖨️ A sheet to print for this

🖨️ Print a sheet and go and look

🖨️ Sheet to take outside →

Worth knowing about Centaurus A

On that same scale, Centaurus A would be about 13 kilometers away. Light takes 13.0 million years to get here from Centaurus A, so what you are looking at is Centaurus A as it was 13.0 million years ago.

What it is made of: A strange elliptical galaxy sliced by a thick, dark dust lane — evidence it swallowed a smaller spiral galaxy long ago.
What makes it worth knowing: A supermassive central black hole fires a radio jet roughly a million light-years long, making it one of the brightest radio sources in the sky; a popular SDR/amateur radio astronomy target.
Its name and its story: Named for the constellation Centaurus, representing the wise centaur Chiron from Greek myth.

The numbers