Rathdrum, ID's night sky, measured from orbit

Satellite radiance puts Rathdrum in the suburban edge band. A noticeable glow near the horizon. Brighter stars and constellations are easy to pick out; the Milky Way is washed out. That's brighter than 16.6% of the 3,206 US cities in this dataset.

Note the source: a satellite reading of upward light, not a visual Bortle scale reading. The two measure related but different things.

Where to go for a darker sky near Rathdrum

Pasco, WA, about 149 miles away as the crow flies, measures in the rural band, one step darker than Rathdrum. Actual driving distance will run longer than that straight-line figure.

Pasco, WA is itself still a measured city, not a designated dark-sky park, this only compares against the 3,206 places this dataset covers.

How Rathdrum compares nationally

Rathdrum, ID counts roughly 12,626 residents, among the 3,206 US cities this site tracks. Rathdrum places 531 of 3,206 cities in this dataset's darkest-to-brightest order.