Lights of Wisconsin, As Seen From Michigan 4/25/2020

Sheyboygan is lovely this time of year

    A few times per year from the shores of Lake Michigan atmospheric conditions refract light in such a way as to make the city lights in Wisconsin visible from the Michigan side, 60+  miles away.
  The photo below is toward Manitowoc and they could be radio towers.....

.....or they could be the taillights of a bunch of cars crashed into a bunch of houses

I googled Manitowoc at night and this image resulted

   Should have known some atmospheric funny business was in store when the setting sun couldn't decide if it wanted to set or rise.

  I had taken video of the sunset but when I went to rename all the files in the folder, poof...they all disappeared.  Checked all the folders on the computer but couldn’t find them. Then I  searched the recycle bin but they weren’t there either.  So the remaining photos come from the previous night when similar atmospheric conditions occurred but lack of transparency prevented the city lights from being seen. 

Starlink Light Train 4/24/2020

  Since the middle of last year, Elon Musk's company SpaceX has been launching satellites in groups of 60 with the intention of creating a system which will bring high-speed internet to any location on Earth.  With the satellites all being launched together, they initially form a tight grouping that slowly separates over time as they reach their operational orbits.

   In the first few days the cluster forms what has been referred to as a 'Light Train' as they cross the sky together in a line.  On Wednesday the 7th launch took place and last night they passed over my region.

40 Starlinks rising from the west.

Gaining elevation above the northern horizon.

Heading east.

Disappearing into Earth's shadow.

   Three minutes later the next 20 appeared in the west.  These were dimmer because they were further along in their journey to their higher final operational positions.

   As neat as it was to see the light train, astronomers have serious concerns about how this will effect research and astrophotography when the entire system has been deployed.  Those of you doing the math at home realize that 7 launches of 60 satellites equals 420.  The project calls for 12,000 satellites needed for complete coverage and so far the satellites have been brighter than initially predicted.  After the first launch a black coating was tested to reduce reflectivity and the result was negligible.  Remember the Moon is the color of asphalt and it casts a shadow at night.

Freighter Floating on Air? 4/6/2020

    Early yesterday morning the lake freighter Roger Blough appeared to be floating above Lake Michigan as it passed by yard. I don't think it was a Fata Morgana, an optical illusion that usually results in a severely distorted image because it is an inverted image of an inverted image. I think my photo just depicts the ship surrounded in a haze that makes the water the same color of the background sky.

   Another nerdy thing seen from the yard the other day was the International Space Station having a favorable pass over west Michigan last Friday.  I was able to get a few photos with my 500mm lens plus a 1.4x teleconverter.

Venus and the Stars of Winter 3/1/2020

  Last night after a windy and overcast winter I took advantage of first clear moonless night of spring to get some parting shots of the winter stars as they sink lower in the west each evening.  In the photo above Sirius the Dog Star, is the bright one on the left, the constellation Orion is toward the middle to the upper left of the peak of my house and the orangish star to the upper right of the peak is Aldebaran the eye of Taurus the Bull. In a couple of weeks they will be lost in evening twilight not to been seen in a dark sky again until August or September when they'll rise before the morning dawn.

  You may have noticed the jet sneaking into the frame as a streak of light emerging from behind the house peak.  Jets weren't the only things interfering with my astrophotography attempts.  The photo below shows another jet and two satellites.

Jet on left, stable satellite in the middle and a tumbling satellite on the right

   The changing brightness from not visible to bright as Venus is indication the satellite that left the dashed line is tumbling out of control with a period of about 5 seconds. 

  In the photo above, the light paths were cropped  (and in the case of the tumbler, rotated for composition purposes) to show the differences in the light trails they leave.

    Venus was bright enough to cast a shadow and did a admirable job lighting up the lake during the 30 second photo below.

Aurora 9/1/2019

 

   Predictions of auroral activity had been all over the local news since mid-week.  Friends and relatives had been asking me if I had heard of the pending Northern Lights display.  My reply dampened their expectations since the Kp index was only forecast to hit 5 or 6.  Besides that the timing of peak activity was supposed to occur when our local area was under cloudy skies. 

  Anyway I woke at 4:30 this morning and looked out to see that the sky had cleared.  So I checked my favorite website http://spaceweather.com/ to see what the geomagnetic conditions were.  They indicated a level of Kp 5 which doesn't make for a visually detectable display from my location but my camera can sometimes catch it anyway. So I packed the camera and the dog and headed toward the state park.

Slightly green on the horizon at level Kp 5

    The strength of the northern lights can vary quickly and they did. Fortunately intensity to probably Kp 6 and the display became barely visible to my eye but easily within the range of my camera.

Exposure - 30 seconds at f/3.5 and ISO 8000

Telephone pole and sand silo cropped out.

Milky Way over Lake Michigan

Sunset and Thunderstorm 8/28 & 8/29 2019

    As beautiful as a sunset can be over Lake Michigan, it got kicked up a notch as recent volcanic activity in western Pacific have infused the stratosphere with sulfurous aerosols which are adding purple and gold to sunrises and sets in the northern hemisphere. 

   Last Wednesday I went down to the lakeshore and unsuccessfully tried to photograph the green flash (saw it but overexposed it) at sunset.  In the twilight aftermath the clouds and sky took on vivid hues to make a great backdrop for two Ludington icons.

The SS Badger and the Ludington Lighthouse

  Tried again for the green flash the next night but it didn't materialize but thunderstorms 50 miles to the south made the effort worthwhile.

Lunar Eclipse 1/21/2019

   Winter weather tried to dissuade me from viewing the total lunar eclipse last night but it's going to have to try a little harder next time.  When the eclipse began the temperature was 5 F and conditions were both clear and snowing.  The light snow must have been blowing in off the lake while mostly clear skies were present at my location