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Mumbwa

-14.983° S   27.062° E  ·  1185 M
60 /100
PEAK
Worth setting up — 3 hours of workable sky from 20:00.
BEST WINDOW 20:00–23:00 · ASTRO DARK 20:00–06:00 · MOON 0%
Transparency
0.68
Seeing
0.86
Cloud
31%
Moon
0%

Good tonight

Hour by hour, local to Mumbwa. Colour encodes the score and nothing else; every other measurement is luminance.

Sky state
Lighter = daylight and twilight  ·  unshaded = astronomical dark
Score
19
20
21
22
23
00
01
02
03
04
05
06
07
38
60
41
50
22
29
17
8
8
7
22
7
0
BEST WINDOW
Low cloud
2%
0%
12%
2%
0%
0%
0%
0%
0%
5%
7%
10%
7%
Mid cloud
34%
30%
48%
39%
81%
62%
85%
98%
98%
100%
74%
28%
4%
High cloud
0%
0%
0%
0%
0%
0%
0%
0%
0%
0%
0%
0%
0%
Transparency
0.68
0.62
0.60
0.57
0.62
0.25
0.47
0.51
0.54
0.53
0.49
0.43
0.41
Seeing
0.86
0.84
0.84
0.79
0.70
0.70
0.67
0.64
0.61
0.58
0.57
0.59
0.57
Moon clear
down
down
down
down
down
down
down
down
down
down
down
down
0%
Inspect

Cloud tracks show clear sky — a longer bar is better. The figure inside each track is the raw measurement.

Why this hour scored what it did
19 Fair · 38/100
Starting from
100
Cloud
−31
Transparency
−9
Seeing
−2
Moonlight
−0
Darkness
−20
Score
38
CLOUD 34% LOW 2% MID 34% HIGH 0% SUN -13.9° MOON -13.0° / 0% WIND 3 TEMP 21°
Excellent 75+ Good 55+ Fair 35+ Poor 15+ Not worth it Seeing is estimated from surface wind — see how we score.
Tonight's limiting factor
When a clear gap is worth driving for

Ask how long the gap is relative to your setup time and your exposure length. A two-hour gap is a real session for a visual observer and close to worthless for someone doing four-minute subs on a target that needs three hours.

What are you doing tonight?

The same forecast, weighted for the target. Planetary work barely cares about moonlight; long exposures die on high cloud a visual observer would never notice.

SET UP 19:30 · OBSERVE 20:00–23:00 · 3H · MEAN 52

Darkness and moonlight dominate. Faint fuzzies need a genuinely dark sky more than they need steady air.

19212301030507
ASTRONOMICAL DARK FROM 20:00CLOUD RETURNS 23:00
SET UP 18:30 · OBSERVE 19:00–23:00 · 4H · MEAN 53

Seeing is everything and moonlight is irrelevant. Bright targets punch through twilight, so darkness barely counts.

19212301030507
CLOUD RETURNS 23:00MOONLIGHT IGNORED FOR THIS TARGET
SET UP 18:30 · OBSERVE 19:00–23:00 · 4H · MEAN 47

Tolerates soft seeing, but high cloud wrecks a wide frame and moonlight raises the background everywhere.

19212301030507
CLOUD RETURNS 23:00
SET UP 19:30 · OBSERVE 20:00–21:00 · 1H · MEAN 49

Needs conditions to hold still for hours. Sustained transparency matters more than any single good hour.

19212301030507
ASTRONOMICAL DARK FROM 20:00CLOUD RETURNS 21:00
SET UP 19:30 · OBSERVE 20:00–23:00 · 3H · MEAN 49

Naked eye, whole sky. Total cloud and moonlight are the only things that count.

19212301030507
ASTRONOMICAL DARK FROM 20:00CLOUD RETURNS 23:00
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The next week of nights

Tonight · 12 Aug
60
Good
MOON 0%
20:00–23:00
Tomorrow · 13 Aug
77
Excellent
MOON 2%
20:00–06:00
Friday · 14 Aug
78
Excellent
MOON 6%
20:00–06:00
Saturday · 15 Aug
87
Excellent
MOON 13%
20:00–21:00
Sunday · 16 Aug
89
Excellent
MOON 21%
02:00–03:00
Monday · 17 Aug
86
Excellent
MOON 30%
02:00–03:00
Tuesday · 18 Aug
90
Excellent
MOON 39%
02:00–03:00
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Nearby locations

About this forecast

Conditions for Mumbwa, Zambia are computed from the MET Norway forecast model for these exact coordinates, combined with sun and moon positions we calculate directly. The score weighs cloud cover by layer, atmospheric transparency, estimated seeing, moonlight and how dark the sky actually gets. Read the full method →