My star chart has a point labeled "NEP." What does this mean?

On Fri, 21 Apr 2000, Richard wrote:

> Equatorial: 18h 00m +66d 32' 00"
> Listed on the charts I have as "NEP".

"NEP" stands for the "North Ecliptic Pole", or the "north pole" of Earth's
orbit around the sun. Note that the coordinates you gave are 23 degrees
and 28 minutes away from the North Pole - that is the amount of Earth's
rotational axis tilt.

If you'd like to see a picture of the sky there, go to
http://arch-http.hq.eso.org/dss/dss
This web site contains online access to the Palomar Sky Survey. Enter the
coordinates (with spaces in between the degrees, minutes and seconds),
select an image size (10x10 is usually good) and output format of "Display
as GIF file".

Thanks for writing!

Sincerely,
Kurtis Williams

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