Omega Nebula (M17) as seen by the VST

The Omega Nebula has many other names, such as Swan Nebula, Checkmark Nebula, Lobster Nebula, and the Horseshoe Nebula. It has been catalogued as Messier 17 or M17 and as NGC 6618 as well, and is situated in the constellation Sagittarius . These images were taken with a new telescope of the European Southern Observatory (ESO) known as the VST. According to ESO: "The VLT Survey Telescope (VST), the latest addition to ESO's Paranal Observatory, has made its first release of impressive images of the southern sky. The VST is a state-of-the-art 2.6-metre telescope, with the huge 268-megapixel camera OmegaCAM at its heart, which is designed to map the sky both quickly and with very fine image quality.(..) It is housed in an enclosure immediately adjacent to the four VLT (Very Large Telescope) Unit Telescopes on the summit of Cerro Paranal under the pristine skies of one of the best observing sites on Earth." CREDITS: All images of NGC5139 were released by ESO under an Attribution-Unported, 3.0 Creative Commons License. For more information about the authors of these images please watch the credits at the end of this video. Background music by BUTTERFLY TEA - "Ghost from the Past" from the album "Butterfly Reloaded"; released by its author under an Attribution, Non-commercial, Share-alike, 3.0 Creative Commons License.