NGC 247 Claw Galaxy

Capture

Seestar s50 754 stacks

Date

15–20 September 2026

Location

Camden, NSW

Original

1103 × 1964 px

NGC 247 Claw Galaxy, also known as Caldwell 62 and nicknamed the Claw Galaxy or Needle's Eye Galaxy, is a spiral galaxy about 11 million light-years away in the constellation Cetus. It belongs to the Sculptor Group, the nearest group of galaxies beyond our own Local Group, and spans about 70,000 light-years. Its most striking feature is a large void on the northern side of its disk, which gives it the "eye of the needle" look. That region is short of gas, the raw material for new stars, so star formation there has stopped. It contains mostly older, redder stars and few young blue ones. NGC 247 is gravitationally bound to the Sculptor Galaxy (NGC 253), and the pair form the core of the Sculptor Group. The short line of small galaxies nearby is Burbidge's Chain, which lies far in the background at about 300 million light-years. Apparent magnitude 9.86

See it in the galaxies gallery