Light Pollution

discoconway

Hey guys,

Am new to the astronomy stuff, bought a Celestron C8 for Christmas. Anyone have any tips of where's best to go viewing? I'm in Dublin, Blackrock specifically and have been using Killiney hill the last couple of occasions. However, light pollution is pretty bad there too. Seeing as tonight should be clear would love to get to see saturn for the first time. Anyone got any good viewing spots in the dublin/wicklow north area? My scope should be powerful enough for deep sky observation so the less light pollution the better. Anyone got any favourite viewing spots?

Thanks guys.

Phil

WalterMitty

http://www.irishastrosoc.org/wordpress/?page_id=85

http://www.roe.ac.uk/roe/support/pr/pressreleases/070117-darkskylaunch/darksky01.jpg

Dublin .Wicklow mountains are best bet judging by the light pollution map above. I go down to bull island sometimes as it seems to be a bit of an island of darkness being out in Dublin bay and with St Annes park beside it on the coast.

You shouldnt need to be that far from dublin lights to see saturn

dlofnep

I would hate to live in Dublin. Waterford is bad enough for light pollution. I have to go out to the coast to get away from it. If you can see the milky way, then seeing conditions are good. That's the general rule of thumb.

backboiler

dlofnep wrote: »

I would hate to live in Dublin.
...
If you can see the milky way, then seeing conditions are good.

I've got used to most of the ups and downs of living here over the last decade or two but one constant, grinding annoyance is the impossibility of seeing anything even remotely deep-sky, including the Milky Way.

Tyrant^

Any good spots for seeing the Milkyway around Leinster ?

I stopped along the R756 up the wicklow mountains before. Clear night. Could see the milky way, but it was extremely faint !
I could see a yellow hue to the North I assume this was all of Dublins light pollution.

Calibos

Lads, the beauty of the planets and the Moon is that they are unaffected by light polution. In fact for astronomers the bloody moon is one of the biggest sources of light polution of them all when it comes to viewing DeepSky objects like galaxies and nebulas. The view in the eyepiece of the first quarter moon or Venus, Jupiter or Saturn will be as good from your back garden under a street/spot light as it is from a dark sky site. The only thing you'd miss by viewing them at home under lights as opposed to a darksite is the naked eye view of the beauty of the planets hanging in a diamond dust encrusted black sky like bright sparkling jewels. But you see that as an aside when you go up the mountains for the purposes of Galaxy and Nebula viewing.

Put it this way. Members of astronomy clubs organise their outreach events where we show the public the moon and planets and brightest deep sky objects like the Orion Nebula with our telescopes, during the weeks where the moon is in the Sky. Light polution in an urban location or moonlight polution doesn't matter for the objects we generally show the public. Its the weeks where the moon is waning and around new moon where its gone from the sky when we organise our trips up the mountains to get away from the light polution so we can better see the faint galaxies and nebulas.