This morning, on 5 August 2025, about 0:45 UTC, I was lucky to capture a nice view of the (still faint) comet C/2025 K1 ATLAS against the Milky Way in wide view with Collinder 399 (a.k.a. Brocchi’s Cluster or ‘Coat Hanger’). What a nice photo-opp! The comet itself moves very quickly in the sky as…
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If Scottish physicist Charles Wilson (1869–1959) had known what he would cause with his discovery of an unconfirmed phenomenon that he himself allegedly saw (in 1924), but was first recorded by physicists in 1989, he would probably have whistled with joy. Upper-atmospheric lightning, a still unexplored celestial phenomenon, is a welcome sight for all “hardcore”…
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Every year in mid-August, almost at the same time like the Perseids, another meteor shower peaks: the κ-Cygnid. Named after the star Kappa (κ) in the Swan constellation, from where the slow meteors seemingly appear, they are almost not known as–unlike the Perseids–they have a very low rate of meteors, only about 3 per hour…
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La Mano del Desierto, Hand of the Desert, Desert Hand. A unique 11-meter reinforced concrete sculpture located about 62 km south of the Chilean city of Antofagasta, was built in 1992 by the now 85-year-old sculptor Mario Irarrázabal Covarrubias and attracts hundreds to thousands of tourists from all over the world every day. It is…
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This early morning, on 3rd July 2025, the bright NLCs appeared over Central Europe. I found a great spot by Proseč u Seče, Czech Republic. When I started shooting, I found out that cows are close… and a bull too. I was pretty scared of the bull, as he seemed very aggressive, but I managed…
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On June 14th, 2025, the clear skies offered me another successful photography of the International Space Station transit in front of the Sun. Taken from Hranice (u Chotěboře), Czech Republic, as a sequence on a 10-inch Dobsonian Telescope, when ISS was about 467,9 km far from me and the whole transit took only 0.59 seconds.…
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Every year around the summer solstice, the Sun sets over the old Lichnice castle ruins when viewed from the Seč city. Lichnice was constructed in the first half of the 13th century. It was first mentioned in 1261, when it was in the possession of Smil of Ronow, who called himself Smil of Lichtenburg, thereby…
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