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Space
Space
Science
Robert Lea

Distant nebula looks like fleeing turkey in festive new Very Large Telescope photo

A gathering of red and pink gaseous nebulas in space in the vague shape of a chicken.

Pass the cranberry sauce! A distant star-forming nebula looks like a turkey fleeing a cosmic Christmas dinner in a new telescope image.

The festive photo, taken by the European Southern Observatory's (ESO) Very Large Telescope (VLT) in Chile, features the star-hatching clouds of gas and dust that comprise the nebula IC 2944, located around 6,500 light-years from Earth. IC 2944 has a distinctly fowl-like appearance, so astronomers have nicknamed it the "Running Chicken Nebula."

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