Twilight

I awoke the Sunday after sunset to find patches of clear sky visible through the clouds. The prospect of clear skies, even two days after sunset, was tremendous.

The sun is pretty big, and "sunset" only refers to the moment when its center crosses the horizon, while assuming there is no atmosphere to bend the light. The upshot of that is that part of the sun can appear to linger above the horizon for days after the official sunset.

Through the day, clouds continued to clear, and some amazing colors began to resolve themselves. Opposite the sun (which was still obscured by low clouds circling the horizon), the Earth's shadow was creeping up, a dark blueish-purple band just above the ground. Above that, a swathe of purples and pinks, topped by a nearly full moon.

From DSL, the station was backlit by the mostly-set sun, which threw up a rainbow of colors as a backdrop.


The temperature had soared to a record high, -38C. We haven't seen temperatures like that since station close, and it left us free to take pictures outside for hours, developing admirable eye-frost.