It is currently about halfway through the Milky Way, crossing the galactic equator.

The galactic equator runs through the following constellations:

Jenkins said that precession would align the Sun precisely with the galactic equator at the 2012 winter solstice.

Taurus is the only constellation crossed by all three of the galactic equator, celestial equator, and ecliptic.

NGC 6204 is an open cluster in the constellation Ara, lying close to the galactic equator.

Galactic latitude is positive towards the north galactic pole, the poles themselves at 90 and the galactic equator being zero.

This position was also very near the galactic equator, making it almost impossible to find such an object within the dense concentration of background stars of the Milky Way.

The stars of the Triangle are located in the band of the Milky Way which marks the galactic equator, and are in the direction of the galactic center.

The galaxy is near the galactic equator where dust obscuration makes it a difficult object for both amateur and professional astronomers to observe, though it can readily be detected even with binoculars.

Its dimensions are difficult to determine by radio observation due to its location near the Zone of Avoidance, the regions of the sky obscured by interstellar dust along the galactic equator.

Based on a view from Earth, one may look towards major constellations for a rough sense of where the borders of the quadrants are: (Note: by drawing a line through the following, one can also approximate the galactic equator.)

Astronomers such as David Morrison argue that the galactic equator is an entirely arbitrary line and can never be precisely drawn, because it is impossible to determine the Milky Way's exact boundaries, which vary depending on clarity of view.

Jim smiled slightly at Deneb, then let his eyes drift on northward through the base of the Triangle, following the faint band of the Milky Way and the Galactic Equator through Cygnus into Lacerta, Cassiopeia, Andromeda.

Jenkins himself notes that even given his determined location for the line of the galactic equator, its most precise convergence with the center of the Sun already occurred in 1998, and so asserts that, rather than 2012, the galactic alignment instead focuses on a multi-year period centred on 1998.