The Saturn Nebula is a small, bright planetary nebula located one degree west of 4.5 magnitude star Nu Aquarii.
NGC 7009 was first seen by Sir William Herschel in 1782, and was one of the earliest discoveries in his sky survey. In 1850, Lord Rosse gave it the name "Saturn" Nebula when he saw extensions projecting from its disk. These projections may be seen with a medium-size scope on a good night.
The object is on many 'best of' observing lists; it is number 55 in the Caldwell Catalog. The Saturn Nebula has a very bright (magnitude 8.0) bluish-green disk elongated 30" x 25" E-W. Two short, faint equatorial rays or 'ansae' ("handles") extend from the ends of the major axis, giving the Saturn Nebula its name. At 200x, faint "bulbs" or condensations are visible at the end of each ansa. There is a halo extending out to about 100".
The Saturn nebula was originally a low-mass star that has transformed into a rather bright (magnitude 11.5) white dwarf star. The distance to NGC 7009 is not well known, because there are no reference stars in its neighborhood that could be used to accurately gauge its distance. Our current best estimates are that NGC 7009 lies about 2,900 light years away.