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Which limb(s) of the Milky Way do we see at night?
The Milky Way has spiral limbs. We live in one of them.
Does the view we can see with the naked eye of the Milky Way include the limb we are in? Is it another limb(s) too?
I like the answers so far. But for clarification. Thank you very much. I wonder how much of the Milky Way which the naked eye sees, are stars from our own 'arm'. 90%, and is that what the answer meant when saying that most of the stars we see are on our arm - meaning most of what we see on the Milky Way route of milky glow?
2 Answers
- ?Lv 710 years agoFavorite Answer
They are called arms, not limbs. Most of the naked eye stars we see at night are in the same arm of the Milky Way that we are in, the Orion Arm. In December and January we are looking outward towards the next arm out, the Perseus Arm. In June and July we are looking inward towards the next arm in, the Sagittarius Arm, except for one tiny peephole which allows us to see a little bit of the next arm inward, the Norma Arm. In the southern hemisphere, they also see parts of the Centaurus Arm, between the Sagittarius Arm and the Norma Arm.
Seen from the north side of the Galaxy, it looks like this:
Norma
...............Centaurus
Sagittarius
...............Ori*on <= * marks Sun
Perseus
Source(s): Terence Dickinson: NightWatch (Firefly) - ?Lv 710 years ago
Considering the size of our galaxy, a barred spiral galaxy 100,000-120,000 light years in diameter containing 200–600 billion stars, I assume we see a small part of the limb we are in with the naked eye, probably about 3000 according to several sources.
