Antlia Constellation

We were happy to get the Big dipper back in the sky towards northwestern sky. But we really miss the bright stars of April nights. At 7 pm, located the Antlia constellation in the 70 degrees south western sky. Only one star faintly visible to the naked eye and thanks to the astro-photograhy mode of gcam could capture the constellation as such.

Antlia Constellation:

Antlia is an extremely faint constellation with no stars brighter than magnitude 4. The brightest star in the constellation is Alpha Antilae. It is 62nd in size of the 88 known constellations. It is relatively a new addition too.

The constellation Antlia, is located in the southern hemisphere of the sky. Its name means "pump" in Latin and Greek; it represents an air pump. Originally Antlia Pneumatica, the constellation was established by Nicolas-Louis de Lacaille in the 18th century, though its name was later abbreviated by John Herschel. The French astronomer, Nicolas, thought of it as the Pneumatic Machine (pic courtesy Wikipedia) and hence named it so.