YozoraAtlas

How dark is the sky in Northeast?

Sky darkness for 2 towns and parks in Northeast, worked out from NASA satellite images of light at night (2025). 1 of them has skies of Bortle 4 or darker, where the Milky Way shows overhead. The darkest is Jökulsárgljúfur (21.85, Bortle 3), the brightest Akureyri (18.03, Bortle 8). The bright core of the Milky Way never climbs clear of the horizon haze anywhere in Northeast while the sky is fully dark; the rest of the band passes overhead, with the longest moonless nights from October to February.

19 Bortle class, 1 pristine to 9 city center park or dark-sky place city

Numbers like 21.95 or 16.97 are the brightness of the sky overhead on a clear, moonless night, in mag/arcsec². The scale runs backwards: a lower number means a brighter sky, from about 22 for a natural sky to about 17 in a city center.
How the readings are made

NASA satellite night-lights map of Northeast with every place marked

Darkest skies in Northeast

  1. JökulsárgljúfurBortle 321.85

Among the places on this site. Plenty of land between them is just as dark, with no town or park to name it by.

Brightest city skies in Northeast

  1. AkureyriBortle 818.03

All 2 places in Northeast

Amber names are parks and certified dark-sky places. The figure is the Bortle class: 1 darkest, 9 city center.