Andromeda Revealed

The constellation of galaxy of Andromeda against the landscape of an old mine in Dark Sky Alqueva, Portugal. Move the slider on the image.

From the photographer: “This is a single shot made with a tracking mount of the rising Andromeda above a puddle of acid water in Achada do Gamo. Andromeda Galaxy or M31 stands very well visible and aligned between two chimneys from the century old mine of São Domingos in Mértola, highlighted against a faint greenish background from a thin band of airglow. With more than 4 times the angular size of the full moon as seen from Earth, this great edge-on spiral galaxy is at a mere 2.5 million light-years distant from us, being the closest large spiral to our own Milky Way, easily visible to naked eye under dark skies. Close to the Andromeda Galaxy in this part of the sky is another neighboring spiral known as M33 or the Triangle Galaxy.”