Southern Pleiades

A very young open cluster of bright blue-white stars. The first Western astronomer to document it was Lacaille during his stay in Cape Town (1751/2). His comment, “like the Pleiades”, is the origin of its popular name, the “Southern Pleiades”. It is also known as the Theta Carinae Cluster.

Catalog Numbers: IC 2602, Lacaille II.9, Caldwell 102

Location: Carina (10h 43.2m, −64° 24.0ʹ)

Angular size: 1.5°

Size: 14 light years diameter

Distance: 160 pc, 530 light years

Age: 40 to 50 million years

Luminosity: 4 500 Suns

Highlights: 

• One of the nearest star clusters to us.
• Lies in the Orion (or Local) Arm of the Galaxy (in which the Sun also lies).
• Brightest object in the IC catalogue.
• In a one-degree field of view there are about 60 stars brighter than 11^th Magnitude