Constellation Orion Declination +09° 56.0′ Estimated age 5.0 Myr | Right ascension 05 35 06 Distance 1,300 ly (400 pc) | |
Collinder 69 (Lambda Orionis Association) is an open star cluster located north-west of the star Betelgeuse in the constellation of Orion. It is about five million years old and roughly 1,300 ly (400 pc) away from the Sun. Included within the cluster is a double star named Meissa. With the rest of Orion, it is visible from the middle of August in the morning sky, to late April before Orion becomes too close to the Sun to be seen well. It can be seen from both the northern hemisphere and the southern hemisphere.
The cluster is following an orbit through the Milky Way that has a period of 227.4 million years with an ellipticity of 0.06, carrying it as far as 28 kly (8.6 kpc) from the Galactic Center, and as close as 25 kly (7.7 kpc). The inclination of the orbit carries it up to 260 light-years (80 parsecs) away from the galactic plane. On average it crosses the plane every 33.3 million years.