Witches flying on their brooms are not the only thing we expect on Halloween. Perhaps more common are ghosts (or at least children covered in white sheets pretending to be ghosts).
This is a recent image of the “Ghost of Gamma Cassiopeia” from October 5, 2021. I’ve shared previous efforts at imaging this ghost, but this one is just a bit better. As everyone knows, ghosts are notoriously difficult to capture on film.
Gamma Cassiopeia is the middle star in the northern constellation Cassiopeia, shaped like a giant W. Gamma comes after Alpha and Beta, so this star should be the third brightest in Cassiopeia, but it is highly variable so it is sometimes the brightest. It also has some gasses nearby that are illuminated by the intense starlight forming a “reflection nebula”. The Ghost is a reflection nebula.
In this image I’ve cropped out the surrounding stars, including Gamma Cassiopeia which is just above the frame. There are actually a few translucent ghosts that we can see right through. These particular ghosts are definitely not children draped in white sheets.
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