NLC near Bristol (3 July 2011 am) ?

[malcolmp]

Greetings all, thanks for interesting forum, have been watching/reading for a while now but have not had anything to say/contribute
Now, thanks to the alerts last night (2/3July) I was able to jump in my car and get to a suitable site (2am through to dawn) to get my first NLC ( I think ! )
Not as good as all your beautiful pictures from up north, but here is my humble effort at The Plough (Ursa Major) and what I think is a low down NLC, what do you think ?

sites.google.com/site/ptarmigan2m/_/rsrc/1309713393580/nlc1/80579a.jpg

with a crop here
sites.google.com/site/ptarmigan2m/nlc1/80579b.jpg?attredirects=0


Malcolm.

Attachments:

[markt]

Nice shot and welcome to the forum!

[Bill W]

Hi Malcolm,
Welcome aboard!, it certainly looks like nlc to me. Hopefully there will be more bright displays over the coming couple of weeks.
Cheers,
Bill.

[sonic]

Hi Malcolm... Yes that's NLC isn't it. I'm further south than you by some way in Torbay but have seen two very impressive displays in the last few week. (pics on my website) Last night I watched up till 4:30am and saw nothing, fingers crossed for tonight as the weather forecast is going downhill for the rest of the week.
Chris

[malcolmp]

>Hopefully there will be more bright displays over the coming couple of weeks.
Thanks Mark and Bill, yes fingers crossed for more, and for more good alerts from the forum because I am on the south side of a hill and need good warning to get over onto the other side !

Chris>
very interesting I didnt realise those previous events had reached this far south.
Infact last night I nearly gave up about 1am with nothing seen here, but as it was the weekend I decided on a last look at about 2am and there I was till dawn !
Weather sat. pictures look good for down your way for tonight, but we have a bit of cloud now that is being a bit stubborn.

Thanks for the confirmation guys,
I should have said :- the pics were 60sec f2.8 ISO100 with a Panasonic FZ18

[ciderman]

Malcolm

Good to see someone else from somerset, i am down in south somerset, i tend to set my alarm for the morning displays for 2.30 as i have found over the last few years that this is the time they start to appear from my location, have enjoyed two fantastic displays in the last week both starting to grow in size and brightness from 2.30/2.45am.

Hope this helps.

[malcolmp]

Thanks ciderman,
yes that helps, I see the error of my ways now I had expected to see earlier activity. My normal betime is usually somewhere between 1 and 2 am, so if I dont see much activity on the alerts by about 1am I have a last 'lightcap' and start winding down so perhaps some catnaps and a later bedtime is indicated for the next month or so !

Sky has cleared in the last few mins. so c'mon y'all do some raindance NLCdance for me us LOL

Malcolm.