GoodSeeing
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Port Hedland

-20.312° S   118.611° E  ·  5 M
86 /100
PEAK
A genuinely good night — 4 hours of clear, dark sky from 02:00.
BEST WINDOW 02:00–06:00 · ASTRO DARK 02:00–06:00 · MOON 0%
Transparency
1.00
Seeing
0.43
Cloud
0%
Moon
0%

Excellent tonight

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

Sky state
Lighter = daylight and twilight  ·  unshaded = astronomical dark
Score
02
03
04
05
06
07
86
86
86
85
11
0
BEST WINDOW
Low cloud
0%
0%
0%
0%
0%
0%
Mid cloud
0%
0%
0%
0%
0%
3%
High cloud
0%
0%
0%
0%
0%
0%
Transparency
1.00
1.00
1.00
1.00
1.00
1.00
Seeing
0.43
0.43
0.42
0.41
0.40
0.39
Moon clear
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
02 Excellent · 86/100
Starting from
100
Cloud
−0
Transparency
−0
Seeing
−14
Moonlight
−0
Darkness
−0
Score
86
CLOUD 0% LOW 0% MID 0% HIGH 0% SUN -63.5° MOON -65.4° / 0% WIND 8 TEMP 17°
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
Transparency vs seeing

Transparency is how much light gets through the atmosphere. Seeing is how steady it is. They are independent, they often move in opposite directions, and which one matters depends entirely on what you are pointing at.

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 01:30 · OBSERVE 02:00–06:00 · 4H · MEAN 94

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

020406
TWILIGHT BEGINS 06:00
SET UP 01:30 · OBSERVE 02:00–07:00 · 5H · MEAN 65

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

020406
TWILIGHT BEGINS 07:00SEEING STAYS SOFT THROUGHOUTMOONLIGHT IGNORED FOR THIS TARGET
SET UP 01:30 · OBSERVE 02:00–06:00 · 4H · MEAN 97

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

020406
TWILIGHT BEGINS 06:00
SET UP 01:30 · OBSERVE 02:00–06:00 · 4H · MEAN 93

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

020406
TWILIGHT BEGINS 06:00
SET UP 01:30 · OBSERVE 02:00–06:00 · 4H · MEAN 100

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

020406
TWILIGHT BEGINS 06:00
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The next week of nights

Tonight · 12 Aug
86
Excellent
MOON 0%
02:00–06:00
Tomorrow · 13 Aug
87
Excellent
MOON 1%
19:00–06:00
Friday · 14 Aug
90
Excellent
MOON 5%
19:00–06:00
Saturday · 15 Aug
84
Excellent
MOON 10%
20:00–21:00
Sunday · 16 Aug
76
Excellent
MOON 19%
02:00–03:00
Monday · 17 Aug
48
Fair
MOON 28%
20:00–21:00
Tuesday · 18 Aug
64
Good
MOON 37%
02:00–03:00
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About this forecast

Conditions for Port Hedland, Western Australia, Australia 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 →