The Veil Nebula (IC6960) is a cloud of heated and ionized gas and dust in the constellation Cygnus.
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The Veil Nebula (IC6960) is a cloud of heated and ionized gas and dust in the constellation Cygnus.
It constitutes the visible portions of the Cygnus Loop, a supernova remnant. The source supernova was a star 20 times more massive than the Sun, and it exploded between 10,000 and 20,000 years ago. The remnants have since expanded to cover an area of the sky roughly 3 degrees in diameter (about 6 times the diameter, and 36 times the area, of the full Moon). About 2400 light-years from earth.
