Alright, so im a bit frustrated with this german weather. Supposedly, winter nights are the clearest because the air holds less moisture. That sounds great and all, if the relative humidity wasnt always at or near 100%.
It goes like this:
10 days of overcast cloud or constant fog
Finally, a clear day
Then it gets foggy within an hour of getting dark.
That means that most of the interesting things (like orion) dont even get to rise up before it gets foggy. And even if they did (which they will in 2 months) i would barely have time to observe them. If i wanted to observe a planet at opposition when its at its highest in the sky, id have to do it at around midnight. But it always gets foggy way before midnight (if its not cloudy if course).
How the hell do people do astronomy, or god forbid astrophotography in winter?
Is there something i dont know? Maybe the air is less humid away from the city, since theres less things going on, adding to the humidity of the atmosphere? Or at higher elevation since all the fog accumulates in valleys? Or is your only option to fly to some place which has a drier climate?
You need to travel somewhere and forget part of your gear. Then instantly the sky becomes Bortle 1 with minimal atmospheric disturbance.
Lol guess ill have to try that
Last night was a beautiful night in southwestern Ohio. In a supposedly Bortle 6 I could clearly see the Orion nebula and it was even above freezing! So of course my mount crapped out on me the moment I started polar alignment in NINA. Like the exact second I pushed the button.
Today I took the whole rig apart to try and figure out what the fuck happened, and nothing was wrong. I am convinced I'm cursed.
Another trick that works really well is sell your gear - Not necessarily all of it, just some vital parts. Then there will be a local power outtage in your city that only affects outdoor-lightning, it will be a sudden new moon - regardless of which phase it's supposed to be in - and clouds will fail to form over your location.
Have you considered sacrificing your first born child to the weather gods ?
What if I have no child ?
Sacrifice your pet maybe?
Right, I'll try
Time to get a new hobby.
That might be the solution ive been looking for
sell your telescope. same night will be clear
Yes but whoever you sell it to will have at least 10 days of clouds.
Same here in Ireland except here it's year round! Yay! /s
Damn, i didnt know its that bad over there. Is there a way to escape it, like going to the mountains?
Not really it's mainly in the west as its mountainous and by the sea meaning its almost always cloudy or rainy. In winter its similar to what you described but luckily there's a month or so with less clouds in the summer but its mainly cloudy most of the year
Don't I know it! I'm in Kerry, lucky enough to have access to Bortle 2 skies on our own land but it's just incessant drizzle. I'd love a 10 or 12 inch dob to take advantage of light pollution free skies but I'm not sure I can justify it.
Not to worry. After the AMOC shuts down things should start drying out.
French here, same struggle. So far I got only one clear night, one or two weeks ago. No clear sky forecasted before the end of 2025...
Il parait qu'à Saint-Michel-l'Observatoire y a 200 jours d'ensoleillement et un seeing divin. Je compte dessus pour ma retraite 😄
Sunday was OK, Jupiter and transit,
the summer also, many dark days,
last winter was OK, some very good days,
autumn 2023 was bad ... yes,
in one week it will be better, cold and clear,
so every month could be good or bad, but you must have time at 6, 9 pm or 1-3 am, that is the life of a telescope-muppet :)
Middle of Canada! Winter is generally just dryer here, but changes in elevation even net me a huge improvement. I can relatively easily get 1-2 thousand above sea level and that's already an improvement. With a bunch more effort I've been at 6500ft and that was spectacular for the eyes. Just clouds of stars to the naked eye. It became difficult to pick out constellations.
Do you guys get a lot of Mediterranean sea air? It was always a humid cold when I visit Czechia in the winter, so I wondered about that.
For me. Sometimes it's just cloudy. Some winters are a total write-off that way.
Brazil summer (your winter) is just rain everyday
Every single day
Damn i thought brazil would be heaven for stargazing. Guess we're all struggling lmao
Same here in Montréal. Last year I missed almost completely the Orion season. This year, I got up early September/October to catch it at the end of the night. November was pretty bad.
Live closer to coasts
That would be the dream
haha this year, in SoCal it has been about a thousand times better than last winter! I think I got about 30 hours of imaging total from November to March! While I haven't had my scope setup in a bit for AP, visually its been great!
https://preview.redd.it/guhwsqwak08g1.jpeg?width=561&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=923fa1276a2e67d240d7ee8a9b35349a4294a3a4
Meanwhile the Mid-Atlantic....clouds, clouds, fog, high winds oh look.....more clouds.
ROFL
Congrats 😠 happy for you 😠 nice 😠
I live in Denver, Colorado, USA. We have 300 sunny days per year on average. With our low humidity, we hardly ever get fog.
It usually takes an eclipse, transit or occultation for us to get an overcast night. We only get a week of clouds if there is a planetary opposition or a supernova.
It makes you wonder if maybe the astrologers have it right.
Of course, at one mile above sea level (1600 meters), it can be cold enough to freeze off your favorite accessories in Winter.
Same in England. When there’s no clouds, it is always foggy. Except for summer, when I get exactly 58 minutes of dark night before the dawn twilight kicks in.
Its like the weather is fucking with yall on purpose
hahaha... 10 days and you're complaining, I don't even remember if there are stars up there anymore last time was Nov 23rd and we had about an hour of time we could observe....I'm sure everyone in my town is getting a telescope for Christmas and a lot must be getting Solar telescopes as we haven't seen the sun either....
Its been like this for more than a month, and im expecting the whole winter to be like this
But yeah, this is way worse. Can i ask where you live?
Vancouver Island in Canada, It doesn't surprise me since it's called the Wet Coast of Canada... Opps that's the West Coast... lol
It’s -20c here at night. I’m just taking a break this season :(
It's been bad here in Norway (Oslo region) the last 3-4 weeks as well.
November and December are without doubt the worst months, it's still warm and humid.
January and February will be better.
Omg an optimist!
Yep on the uk it’s been cloudy or raining or some shit for ages, two nights ago was crystal clear but I felt like shit! There will be clearer nights 👍🏻
You're demonstrating regional differences in overall seasonal weather patterns. Your only play here is to travel to a better site for observing. Look at archive weather patterns for clouds moving in and out using sat websites. Using this you can hone in on areas with a better chance of clearer skies. Another option is if you have any mountains in range that are tall enough to be above tree line (over 2500-3000m typically). This way you can rise above the clouds and view whatever you want. Be advised though, you'll freeze your ass off, so bundle up.
Germany here (Bodenseegebiet). I can't even remember exactly, when it has been that I could really see the galaxies in Spring. It was in 2022 (had to look it up). Since then we have a high layer of the atmosphere with too much humidity. You can't do anything, not even high elevation would help. The effect of good transparency vs. what we have mostly, is more than a telescope twice as big would have.
As a Brit, I feel your pain. Football anyone?
Yeah it's been flying mud since October. I'm gonna miss the Saturn pass. It's a shame, I really wanted a clean picture of flat Saturn, I wanted to use it to bookend my kids childhood.
We need to all come together as a community and not buy any more gear for about a month. We should have a few clear nights if we do that.
A Spaniard here, clear skies and good conditions. It's a shame I don't (yet) have a telescope; I've been reading the sub for a while now, eager to take advantage of this weather.
I am just a bit south of you. Right now the winter is too warm and everything is foggy. Last winter it was much better.
It really just depends on where you live. Here in Japan, most of our clear nights are in autumn and winter. Spring and summer nights are mostly clouded over.
Noone buying any new toys for at least 2 weeks lol
Not be Winter ❄️
You can have one clear night, but it will be the coldest and windiest night of the year.