Lunar Eclipse washout

[OzEclipse]

Several days ago the forecast for last night was pretty clear. Three major models, ECFMW, ACCESS-G, and GFS, were all predicting exactly the same cloud pattern/cover. My location is roughly halfway between Orange and Wagga Wagga.

This was the prediction on Tuesday

and this the satellite cloud photo yesterday afternoon at 430pm, 2 hrs before the eclipse was due to begin.

Thick clouds blanketed the northeastern horizon as sunset neared even though small patches of blue could be seen through light cloud overhead.

With overnight rain predicted, I didn't set up a telescope but I did have a telephoto lens and tripod on hand. Working in my studio, a large 2x1.8 metre window looks out to the north east. Around 9:00UT, I could see a reddish glow in the north. I moved the tripod outside and attached my camera with 300mm lens. The Moon didn't appear. After pacing around for a while, it occurred to me that if I couldn't see the Moon, I could indirectly image the moonlight. I switched to a 14mm wide angle lens. I took a wide angle picture of the reddish orange light cast by the moon. If you look between the trees as well as the sky you can see the reddish light. I have boosted the saturation and had to shift the auto white balance value back to daylight value.

There is no light pollution to speak of here, I'm on the boundary between Bortle 1 & 2 zones.
Photo: 10:22 UT Moon ~50% illuminated.

Then the Moon made a very brief cameo opinion through thin cloud. This was the clearest of several images I took during its 1 min appearance.
Photo: 10:25 UT Moon ~ 50% illuminated.