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20.06. Looking S to SW as I follow the convection. Three areas of precip are falling over the Sperrins now. Things were looking good. I was 100% confident I would see moonbows soon.
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0.12. Jackpot!!. I actually held my fist in the air with delight. The Cows and Sheep in the field stayed in a corner away from me lol. Looking back to the NW, you can see the coloured base of not one, but two moonbows. A bright primary with faint secondary. The row of flashing lights over the mountains is a chopper. The primary bow suddenly became extremely bright. Much more than on the previous night. I stole a glance behind and saw that the Moon was shinning with it's full brilliance in a crystal clear sky with not a cloud in sight. I was able to increase the ISO to 400 to capture the scene better, something I couldn't do in the first session.
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20.14. I was very happy with this vertical capture. The intense colours of the moonbow and orange clouds above looked great as they contrasted against the clear sky and stars above. From R to L is Bootes, Corona Borealis, Serpens Caput, and Hercules.
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20.14. With the naked eye this bow literately seemed to jump out from the sky. The colours were amazing combined with it's intense magnitude. With the naked eye, from outside to inside, I could see bright red, yellow-white, and blue colours. The rain falling on the light looks like a glowing pot of gold at the base of the bow.
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20.15. Bow getting bigger. Again Arcturus pops out to the R.
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20.16. Bow is extending out of frame to the L as the clouds and showers get higher and closer. There's a nice intense, narrow, precip shaft illuminated by the white light. The NW sector vanished leaving the SW sector over Maghera. Why didn't someone launch a firework at this moment?. A firework and moonbow would have made for an even more rare image.
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20.56. Then the bow was gone. I imaged this next line of convection which followed behind but they didn't produce any precipitation so I ended the session. I included this image because I feel it looks very nice. Session ended at 21.30 again.
I was delighted beyond words to get images of moonbows on two nights in a row. This is without doubt a personal best for me. I wonder if I will get to beat that. I intend on trying to hunt down more moonbows each month if the conditions will allow it. My ultimate goal is to catch these bows in the same frame as lightning, an aurora display, or Noctilucent clouds. It's a big challenge but I will give it my best. To Sum up, I spent five hours spread over two nights and managed to catch two sets of moonbows. I did note however that I only got one set on each night, I never seen more than one which shows that everything needs to happen at the correct time. If you want to know more about the basic ingredients for moonbow formation then check out my other account HERE. I hope you enjoyed the report and images. Thanks for reading.
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Martin McKenna