The Darkest Skies
in Hawaii

"3 good sets, decent night, hazy, visual range 30 miles toward Mauna Loa, less to the ocean, clouds to south cover sky to 4 degrees. Clouds to the east, creeping over the mountains at twilight, but retreated as night progressed. Glowing lava light produces sky glow to northeast, variable possibly because of clouds, haze, or variations in lava flow. Only source of skyglow visible, no light domes. 3 or 4 light trespass lights visible 10-15 miles to west, apparently on the coast, one may have been a boat, read beacon pulsating, brightest light trespass not brighter than 1st magnitude star. Seeing fair-poor early, settling down to fair later. High frequency twinkling in stars, indicating upper atmosphere wind shear. Transparency variable depending on smoke plume from crater, good overall, occasionally fair, ZLM 7.2 Draco. Center of Milky Way galaxy as it climbs above the horizon becomes brightest natural source. The landscape is dark, mostly lava, low albedo, hard to get around by starlight as a result, white truck reflects it, features in the land difficult to discern. In the Milky Way, the pipe nebula and prancing horse are easy, the fingers of Ophiuchus are not seen. Based on light pollution Class 1, but features seen in the sky don’t compare to other locations where seeing and transparency better. Moisture in the air, volcano plume, poor seeing degrade visual observations. However, a very “natural” sky for the conditions."

"seeing good-very good, transparency excellent, vog from Kilauea Crater to south and west, but below observing location. Light dome from Honolulu seen fairly bright but small. Waimea in the clear, unshielded light seen below the horizon. More airglow tonight than last, Zodiacal light very bright early. No clouds, a flawless sky, Bortle Class 1 if you consider to the true horizon. Virtually no light domes. Visual observations impaired by high altitude, not reliable indicator of sky quality compared with lower altitude locations because of lack of oxygen. Still, the center of the Milky Way tracking nearly overhead is extremely impressive, details in the prancing horse easy, fingers of Ophiuchus are seen with only a little difficulty. SQM 21.81 end of first set. Wind steady at 10-15 mph."

"Low clouds extensive all quadrants, below not obscuring sky, Haleakala sticking up above clouds, possibly one of the peaks on Ohau, north side of big island covered with clouds. City lights of Waimea seen direct, Kona coast occasionally seen through clouds, many unshielded lights low pressure sodium seen from here. Transparency excellent, seeing fair, settling down as night progresses to good. Antares 35-40 degrees above horizon, long period twinkling, no short-period atmospheric shear type twinkling seen tonight as was the last two nights. End of astronomical twilight some clouds to west and north, near the horizon, low clouds covering most of east coast, west coast patchy, lights showing through. Hilo masked by true summit, nothing showing above it in terms of a light dome. Horizon brightness to the east slightly brighter than north or south, however. Zodiacal light strong through Leo, band seen through Spica, east of that not seen, gegenschein is obliterated by Milky Way. SQM meter 21.80 beginning of first data set. Seeing good. Alpha Centauri still twinkling by 11 PM but seeing good overall, excellent overhead. Green laser from observatories will be part of the images. Automobile headlights in first set. Summit of Mauna Kea, 7.1 ZLM, low clouds clearing partially revealing unshielded lights of Hilo area. SQM 21.75 11 PM, 21.66 as Milky Way moves overhead. Airglow brightening slightly, especially to northwest, melding with Zodiacal Light, definite green color, especially around the bowl of the Big Dipper, into the Coma Berenices, seems brighter NNW than SSE. Bortle class 1."

"Cirrus and cumulus clouds everwhere to begin - then almost everything clearing out nicely. Moved to this site (about 2 miles north of summit) to avoid the visitor traffic and much of the direct light from the valley. Set up on some rocks 50' south of the restroom and 150' west of the wind shelter. this night ended up being very good for clear skies. Winds remained mostly calm and the details in the sky were the best so far. Mauna Kea and Mauna Loa were easily visible throughout the evening."

"Lots of cirrus around the horizon - slowly clearing. Similar sky conditions to the previous night with even more visitors staying for the sunset. Wind chill by the middle of the night in the 20's! Collected 6 sets with only 10 minute delay to maximize opportunities and then had time for 2 more before moonrise. Lights in the valley below were occassionally obscured by clouds, so most sets will have variations in light glow to the west. the lookout shelter on the summit is visible to the south and the observatories at "Science City" are visible to the WSW. The Milky Way was again striking in its detail, though it was obscured at about 15° in the NNE by clouds and moisture/humidity."

"1st set started in fog and is unuseable, but the fog cleared before the second set and everyting after set on eis good. After fog cleated the transparency continued to improve throught the ngiht and was best during set 5 and 6. Kilauea crater was smoking and the light from the crater was easily visible, although constantly changing. Very little anthropogenic light visible anywhere. Excellent conditions overall, no clouds, good transparency and good seeing. Milky Way bright and detialied. Dust lanes have fine detial, sagittarius and scutum star clouds bright. Prancing horese easily visible."

"Sky clear of most clouds, but vog still present. A lot of direct glare from streetlights along the Queen K highway, and the industrial park and shopping center across the street. About 120 degrees of Milky Way present with dark lanes visible, mostly over the bay. Ursa Major just visible, but mostly lost in light dome of the Kona Airport. SQM reading of 20.94, but a limiting magnitude of only 5.8. Slight shadow cast from industiral park and shopping center to the east."