NASA Earth Observatory published an astronaut photograph on November 4, 2026, showing nighttime lights across the U.S. Midwest under largely clear skies. According to the agency, the wide-angle image was captured from the International Space Station at 4:54 a.m. Central Daylight Time on October 18, 2026.

Chicago, Illinois, and Detroit, Michigan, appear among the brightest metropolitan areas, while mid-sized cities such as Indianapolis, Indiana, Cincinnati, Ohio, and Louisville, Kentucky, and the highways connecting them also stand out. A diffuse green and orange band along the left horizon is described as airglow, produced when sunlight strikes atoms and molecules in the upper atmosphere and causes them to eject photons. To the right, sunlight arcs across the horizon ahead of sunrise.

NASA says such observations help researchers track changes in the built environment. Using its astronaut photography archive, researchers have developed a method for distinguishing lighting types within nighttime images, and the Black Marble product suite uses satellite data to record nighttime lights over time, including tracking power outages and shifts to LED lighting.