Lunar Eclipse and Dark Skies
Taken by Jan Hattenbach on May 16, 2022 @
La Palma, Canary Islands, Spain
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Camera Used: Canon Canon EOS 6D
Exposure Time: 3645/10
Aperture: f/inf
ISO: 1600
Date Taken: 2022:05:16 12:17:23
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Details:
The May 16 Total Lunar Eclipse was said to be one of the darker ones thanks to the Tonga volcano eruption earlier this year. So I wanted to find out just how dark the sky during totality gets at my favorite Dark Sky spot on the island of La Palma, Spain, at 2000 meters asl. In the best nights, my SQM reads 21.85-21.9 mag/arcsec² there, while in recent years (thanks to increased solar activity?) I rarely get above 21.7.
While setting up my telescope before the eclipse, only a handful of stars were visible in the full moon glare. During partiality, the Milky Way appeared, and once the moon was fully immersed in Earth's shadow, the sky looked exactly like at new moon! My SQM read 21.68 mag/arcsec², pretty much like in a typical moonless night. The image, for which I used a Canon EOS 6D and a 8mm fish-eye lens at f/5.6, ISO 1600, and 360s exposure times, and which I took around 03:37 UTC, looks exactly like the ones I regularly take in moonless nights to check for airglow - were it not for the red spot on the lower right: the fully eclipsed moon!
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