This week, the Smithsonian's Air & Space Magazine features the night sky astronomy photos of Clancy School science teacher Ryan Hannahoe.

Clancy School science teacher Ryan Hannahoe

Hannahoe, who is also director of the Montana Learning Center at Canyon Ferry Lake, got hooked on gazing at the night sky as a kid and built a telescope while a student at Schuylkill Valley Middle School in Leesport, Pennsylvania.

He and the telescope won the Astronomy Award at the Regional Science & Engineering Fair in Reading, Pennsylvania.

During college at Montana State University, Hannahoe spent the summer working at the NASA Goddard Space Flight Center teaching others about the James Webb Space Telescope, the successor of the Hubble telescope. Its launch date is set for October 2018.

In MSU news articles, Hannahoe said it will allow scientists to see to the beginning of the universe... how galaxies formed.

For some of the photos featured this week, Hannahoe took 30 to 50 hours of exposures and then layered them on top of each other to give a clear image.

All the photos Im posting are all taken remotely from either an Australian or New Mexico site, he said. Hes been doing digital astrophotography since 2001.

This is the second time Hannahoe's photos are featured in the Smithsonian's Air & Space Magazine. The first time was in 2011. He's also had three NASA astronomy pictures of the day.

The photos are posted March 6-12, with three to four featured daily. The posting also contains a log of all the images.

Other astronomy-related projects hes doing include building an observatory at his house and chasing down the total solar eclipse this August, probably in Rexburg, Idaho.

A total solar eclipse is a once-in-a-lifetime event," he said. "We haven't had a total solar eclipse in this part of the country since 1979."

Considered one of the most photographed objects in the sky, the Horsehead Nebula resides 1,500 light-years from Earth in the constellation of Orion. This dark nebula represents a cloud of dust and non-luminous gas that appears to represent a horses head. Williamina Fleming, one of the most renowned female astronomers ever, became the first person to observe the horse head-like structure on a photographic plate.

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Smithsonian Air & Space Magazine features Clancy teacher's astronomy photos - Helena Independent Record