Variability of the emission line fluxes and ratios of HH 1/2

Abstract

We compare spectrophotometric data of HH 1 and 2 obtained in 1978 (by Brugel et al. 1981a) with the emission line fluxes from calibrated Hubble Space Telescope (HST) images obtained in 1994 and 2014. This comparison shows that the emission line ratios of these objects have remained surprisingly invariant during the past 36 years. On the other hand, the line intensities have indeed changed, with HH 2 brightening by a factor of ≈ 4 and HH 1 becoming ≈ 30% fainter. These results would be consistent with HH 1 and 2 being leading working surfaces of heavy jets travelling into an environment of decreasing (for HH 1) or increasing (HH 2) densities.