Big Bend stargazing forecast — Friday, August 14

West TX · Bortle 1 · 29.250, -103.250 · Snapshot generated Sat, 15 Aug 2026 02:05:07 GMT

Fair (Medium confidence)

Short 3h window, otherwise mean cloud 65%. Worth a look if you're nearby.

Best observing window tonight

Sat 12:00 a.m. – Sat 2:00 a.m. (3h, 0% mean cloud)

Astronomical night: Fri 3:34 p.m. → Sat 2:21 a.m.
Moon: New moon · 2% illuminated
Mean cloud (during night): 65% (min 0%)

Site

Big Bend National Park has the least light pollution of any national park unit in the lower 48 — a fact the sparse population of the surrounding Trans-Pecos desert makes almost inevitable. It anchors the Greater Big Bend International Dark Sky Reserve, the largest dark-sky-certified place on Earth.

Drive from Toronto: Fly into El Paso or Midland-Odessa, then drive 4–5 hours south to the park.

Best time of year: Fall through spring around new moon; summer heat is severe.

Open the live 48-hour forecast →

Citations & data sources

Open-Meteo Forecast API (cloud, humidity, wind, visibility)
Open-Meteo astronomical data (sunrise, sunset, moon)
Bortle scale reference for site darkness
Editorial guide for Big Bend: /sites/big-bend-np.txt
Structured site data: /sites/big-bend-np.json
Live MCP server (AI agents): https://koohxdehsweadgdegrly.supabase.co/functions/v1/mcp

This is a build-time snapshot — the live forecast at https://ontarionightsky.com/?site=big-bend-np updates continuously.