Five-minute engine

Tonight timeline

Every interval is stopped by at least one physical or safety gate.

11:30 PMScore 0Lunar illumination is below the validated planning envelope
Moonbow Score from 5:00 PM through 6:00 AM. No viable sustained window.255075100

Deterministic

Moon + geometry

Illumination69%
Peak altitude4.3°
Bow error0.1°

Effective skyline 11.9°: 7.7° bare earth + 3.8° trees/clearance. The primary-bow cone is checked against the modeled mist field.

Astronomy Engine (JPL-validated)Calculated locally at five-minute resolutionnot live

Multi-model + nowcast

Moonlight path

Model consensus—
Model spread—
NWS grid—

Multi-model guidance is unavailable for this hour; the engine falls back to available NWS/observed inputs and lowers confidence.

Latest NOAA GOES East day/night cloud product centered on the NWS Jackson, Kentucky forecast area

Low, mid and high clouds receive different optical penalties. GOES gains weight only inside the 0–3 hour nowcast; model disagreement reduces forecast confidence.

NOAA GOES East Clear Sky MaskSatellite not queried because deterministic Moon gates rule out this nightnot live

USGS 03404500

River + mist

ADEQUATE MIST

DischargeUnavailable
Seasonal percentile50th
6-hour trendunknown

Flow drives a saturating mist-production proxy. Exceptional flood flow receives a small conservative overspray penalty rather than assuming more water is always better. Wind direction separately estimates whether spray stays in the useful viewing zone.

USGS 1991–2025 daily-flow distributionCurrent flow not queried because deterministic Moon gates rule out this night; seasonal distribution shown for contextnot live

Conjunctive model

Why tonight

  • Lunar
    NaN
  • Geometry
    100
  • Cloud
    16
  • Mist
    63
  • Mist Placement
    86
  • Atmosphere
    100
  • Wind
    88

Factors multiply. Impossible geometry is a hard gate; cloud transmission, mist production and mist placement cannot be averaged away by strong unrelated conditions.

Primary viewpoint

Falls Overlook

Park at the Visitor Center lot, follow signs toward the lower Falls overlooks, and use the Falls Overlook facing the mist below the main drop.

A paved accessible overlook is available from the Visitor Center area. The closest lower platforms include stairs and can be wet after dark.

Open driving directions Platform coordinate mapped from public trail and aerial data; verify posted park routing on arrival.
95

NOWCAST

Forecast confidence

  • Deterministic Moon, darkness, skyline and bow geometry rule out every five-minute interval
  • Weather and river uncertainty cannot reverse this physical NO-GO

Official planning envelope

Next moonbow windows

Full 2026 calendar
20:30–22:3021:00–23:0021:30–23:3022:00–00:0022:30–00:30

Estimated Moonbow Chance is a coarse model estimate, not an empirically calibrated success frequency.

The Moonbow Score is the underlying physical opportunity index; forecast confidence is calculated separately.

The tree-line and mist-placement corrections remain conservative and will be refined with observer reports.