Angle where Milky Way is brightest

Where, at roughly the same distance from Milky Way centre as Sun, would the Milky Way look brightest?

We are looking at Milky Way edge on. The light of the stars we see is conspicuous because it is concentrated in a narrow band of the sky.

If we looked at Milky Way from the same distance but face on, we would see all the same stars - spread over half the sky, thus much dimmer.

On the other hand, we do not see most of Milky Way. The Cygnus Rift blocks the view of the brightest, inner arms and the core of Milky Way.

How far from the Milky Way disc would we have to be to see round the Cygnus Rift and face the full glare of the Milky Way core?

wow i didnt no you could see the milkyway in the sky. would that be with a telescope or by looking in the night sky

heatherspacejunkie wrote:

wow i didnt no you could see the milkyway in the sky. would that be with a telescope or by looking in the night sky

Well we're in it, so we can't see all of it..

From here you are looking out of our galaxy, go to a dark place on a clear night and you will see the outer spiral arm i saw it tonight.

If you are South, such as Australia you look into the center of the galaxy, i saw that when i was in the Australian desert

The night sky in Australia looks like...

http://www.flickr.com/photos/27646251@N05/2812096134/

Amazing!

Hmm...if you're asking how far above or below the disk we'd have to be to clearly see the core and spiral structure, it's probably a couple of thousand light-years. No doubt many of the globulars (like M 13, which is well above the disk) have spectacular views of the Milky Way's core and spiral structure.