The awesome beauty of the Eagle Nebula

Eagle Nebula, aka M16

The Eagle Nebula, also known as Messier 16 or M16, is one of the most amazing sights you can see in a large telescope. It’s the location of several famous structures, including the stunning Pillars of Creation, a star-forming region, depicted in the image above. The Eagle Nebula contains not only the Pillars of Creation but several other star-forming regions as well. It also has many emission nebulae, or clouds in space that shine with their own light. And it has some dark nebulae. These are space clouds that don’t shine themselves, but that can be seen because they obscure light from shining objects located behind them.

The Eagle Nebula lies in the direction of the constellation Serpens the Serpent. It’s about 7,000 light-years away. And it’s visible in the sky on July and August evenings.

Take a look at the photos here to delve deeper into this region of space, which is one of the most interesting and beautiful we know.

Like an eagle with outstretched wings

Jean-Philippe de Cheseaux is said to have “discovered” the Eagle Nebula in 1745-46. Afterwards, 18th century astronomers began including this object in their catalogs. With their early telescopes, the astronomers could see only the star cluster. And so this object was designated as M16 in Charles Messier’s catalog of things not to be confused with comets. Later, what astronomers thought was a simple open star cluster came to be known as a nebula, or cloud in space. They called it the Snow Queen Nebula.

Still later, the advent of astrophotography revealed a large area of glowing hydrogen gas that was invisible to the unaided eye. The nebula looked somewhat like an eagle with outstretched wings, giving rise to the current common name of Eagle Nebula.

Soon higher-resolution – clearer – photography, and then digital photography, began to reveal more and more features. In particular, astronomers began to notice the dark patches (aka dark nebulae) in the Eagle Nebula. That’s when many distinct features within the Eagle Nebula began to be given individual names. Today, the informal name of the Eagle Nebula is taken as referring to all of these in one collective designation.

Some of them are famous, and all are beautiful.

The Eagle Nebula suddenly burst upon the world’s collective consciousness in 1995, when the Hubble focused its attention on a dark nebula in the center of the Eagle, which you can see in the (updated) photo at the top of this post.

Iconic Pillars of Creation

The mesmerizing dark protrusions of dense gas were found to be the site of the formation of new stars and solar systems. Known as the Pillars of Creation, this photograph gave most people their first view of newly born stars and solar systems at the dawn of their creation. The Pillars of Creation are immense, about 4 to 5 light-years tall. The Eagle Nebula itself spans about 70 by 55 light-years.

Similar areas, such as the Stellar Spire on the left side of the Eagle, are also forming new stars through a combination of processes. The cold, mostly hydrogen gas of the nebula has already fueled the formation of a series of young, hot stars. As the gas continues to collapse under its own gravity into the dark forms we see, new stars and solar systems form and continue to grow as they attract more and more gas to them. However, the intense light pressure from the new stars that have formed and their solar winds are eroding away the dense, cold gas pockets, diminishing new star formation and dispersing the nebulae.

At the same time however, the shock waves, where the light and solar wind impact the cold gas, heat and compress some of the cold gases at the same time, resulting in a new set of star forming environments.

An astronomer’s perspective

As amateur astronomer Martin MacPhee recounted some years ago:

I am very pleased I can see these structures in my ‘scope, which is only 8″ in diameter, especially given that they are located around 7,000 light-years away, and the Stellar Spire is roughly 9.5 light-years (~ 9 trillion kilometers) tall. In seeing them from my driveway in the heavily light-polluted Maryland suburbs of Washington, D.C., I’m doing very well. And for approximately $10,000,000,000 less than the Hubble telescope cost, which makes my wife very happy too!

And there’s more. In 2015, some scientists suggested that the Pillars and Spire were likely already gone, victims of a massive shock wave from a supernova explosion that happened 6,000 years ago and destroyed them. The idea was that its light had already gone past us, but the slower-moving shock waves would have taken thousands of years more to sweep through the Eagle Nebula, destroying the delicate structures we find so entrancing.

Then, in 2018, that view changed again. Another update suggested the former data suggesting destruction were in error. Instead, it seems, these structures – the Pillars and Spire – likely will remain for hundreds of thousands of years more before slowly evaporating away.

Bottom line: The Eagle Nebula, or M16, is home to at least two famous and awe-inspiring cosmic structures: the Pillars of Creation and the Stellar Spire.

Read about how the Pillars of Creation were created