Weird night time sky

[JoeFackel 760]

9 hours ago, LHookins said:

I once drove out to Gilmer, TX, *way* out in the boonies, and the sky was so clear and beautiful that the sight brought tears to my eyes. 

Same here. Over 20 years ago i sat in the desert in deep-south tunesia and it was like sitting on a ball in the middle of the universe (like it is in fact). A crazy, but uplifting feeling.

[RobF2 150]

This time of the year from most Earth latitudes by midnight the Milky way should be overhead.  If you've never ever been out to a truely dark sky location in your life, then make sure at some point you take a folding chair (preferable one that folds back to almost horizontal), some good friends and sit back and take in the Milky Way crossing the sky from horizon to horizon.

You might want to pick a time of year there is a prominent meteor shower too.  The Perseids in August are worth being out for an hour or so to make sure you see quite a few.

Take some binoculars, nibbles and drinks and you'll have a great time.  Make sure there is no moon about and expect to give yourself up to 30mins to really get your eyes fully dark adapted.

 

So sad the modern well lit world is making this sight harder and harder for a larger percentage of people around the world to see.  Modern digital cameras do bring out more "faint stuff" than the human eye can easily discern, but you'd be amazed how bright the Southern MIkly way gets when directly overhead.

 

https://edition.cnn.com/travel/article/pilot-cockpit-photos-christiaan-van-heijst/index.html

[Prpn 366]

I'm still convinced that there is likely no better office view then from the cockpit, except for anything with a window leaving our atmosphere ;). Here's a short timelapse video I made some time ago, Northern Lights and Milky Way. The camera sees more of course, but both were visible to the naked eye quite easily as well.

 

[IanHarrison 522]

11 hours ago, benwbriscoe said:

I get that it exists and it's amazing when we see it. BUT, the majority of flights will not see it and as this is a simulation, I would like it to reflect reality more than fiction. Is there any way to remove it?

Reflect reality is what it is doing now! 

You want it to reflect fiction.😪

[LHookins 3,103]

5 hours ago, RobF2 said:

sit back and take in the Milky Way crossing the sky from horizon to horizon.

You might want to pick a time of year there is a prominent meteor shower too.

A friend of mine was doing contract work in Saudi, and said he went out to the Empty Quarter to watch a meteor shower.  He said the Milky Way was so bright it interfered with seeing the meteors.

Hook

[cmpbellsjc 2,960]

On 7/2/2020 at 3:13 AM, Christopher Low said:

Can he not just disable the texture file, or delete it?

I suppose you could but I prefer not to delete texture files that are going to have a bgl calling on it. Doing so creates the Missing Texture file call up (if you have it enabled for debugging). I’d rather not have the sim calling for something that you deleted. Not sure if it would case any type of lag or stutter,   or performance problem, but I don’t like to take the chance as it could be one more thing to try to trouble shoot if you started having issue and forgot that you did it.

Removing bgl files is one thing but I don’t like to just remove texture files. I’d rather just fix the texture to alleviate the problem, and in this case it only takes a few minutes to edit the file.

[netshadoe 144]

I have been able to see that milkyway from an airplane PAX seat only on our way to Hawaii or Europe...but not when we were over land.  Only once we left the continent and it's light pollution  did it really "pop" out.

My wife and I took time to "work from home" once and sailed our 50 foot Catamaran from just outside Kingston, Ontario (the 1000 islands) to the southern Caribbean leeward islands and back that took about a year to complete. 

Once you leave civilization, the stars become so bright that it actually "lights" the way, especially on the moonless nights.  The stars become so vivid that you can actually "sail by the stars" like they say in the old books!!  And that milky way...wow!  What a sight.  

Not to mention the phosphorescence that the microscopic animals in the water give off when they are disturbed by something passing through the water (the boat, dolphins, your hand, etc.).

Like @RobF2 said above, its too bad that most of humanity has forgotten the simple things in life in this modern era.

Edited July 4, 2020 by netshadoe

[molleh 451]

2 hours ago, netshadoe said:

Like @RobF2 said above, its too bad that most of humanity has forgotten the simple things in life in this modern era.

To be fair, most of us don't have a 50 foot catamaran to sail the oceans for a year to experience what you just described 😛

[RobF2 150]

Expensive boat not required - just availability of a suitable dark site  🙂

https://www.lightpollutionmap.info/#zoom=4&lat=5759860&lon=1619364&layers=B0FFFFFTFFFFFFFFF

 

Light grey zones best.  One of the advantages of living in Australia  🙂

 

 

Edited July 4, 2020 by RobF2

[netshadoe 144]

On 7/4/2020 at 11:17 AM, molleh said:

To be fair, most of us don't have a 50 foot catamaran to sail the oceans for a year to experience what you just described 😛

Lol!  Fair enough.  I worked long and hard (since I was 19 years old) to be able to get it.  Heck, I didn't even have a HighDef TV until 2017 when my old RCA tube TV died.  My wife and I focused on paying off our house fast, didn't buy things to keep up with the Jones', and put the kids through school.  We didn't buy things we couldn't afford, or didn't need...avoided credit cards like the plague and only had debts for practical things, like vehicles. 

So it was a lifestyle choice for 20 years to save up for that dream...others choose to spend their money other ways by buying lots of toys (pickup trucks, Sports cars, big entertainment units for their house, etc, etc...) and there is nothing wrong with that.  We just chose to buy one toy that we plan to retire on.  🙂

On 7/4/2020 at 11:34 AM, RobF2 said:

Expensive boat not required - just availability of a suitable dark site  🙂

True...we have 5 acres 100 km outside of any major city.  The Canadian night sky is still really nice, but it still isn't anywhere close to the outback sky I'm sure!  😉