
If you're away from city lights, the Milky Way becomes bright and beautiful as the total phase begins. The crescent of the moon grows thinner as darkness propagates through a night sky now deprived of moonlight. If the eclipse is a total one, the last remaining minutes of the partial phases can be quite dramatic. During the next hour, the moon gradually dips deeper into Earth's dark umbral shadow. These are easy to see as well, with the unaided eye.Ī lunar eclipse begins as a small notch slowly appears along one edge of the moon. During the total phase (totality), the moon turns a vibrant red color. This occurs when the entire moon passes through the Earth’s umbral shadow. These eclipses are easy to see with the unaided eye. This occurs when a portion of the moon passes through the Earth’s umbral shadow. These eclipses are subtle and hard to observe. This occurs when the moon passes through the Earth’s penumbral shadow. There are two or more lunar eclipses a year.
#Lunar eclipse time michigan full#
31.A lunar eclipse occurs whenever the moon passes through the Earth’s dark shadow, which can only happen during a full moon. This happened with our full moon earlier this month on Jan. A full moon that happens near perigee is called a supermoon by some. The closest point in its orbit is called the perigee. The moon’s orbit is not perfectly circular, meaning its distance from Earth varies as it goes through one cycle. A supersized supermoonįinally, to add the cherry on top, this will also be a supermoon. Stargazers will need to wait until May 18, 2019, for a blue moon that fits this older, original definition.

31 full moon won’t be blue by this definition. We’ll only have three this winter, so the Jan. The second definition of a blue moon states it’s the third moon in a season in which there are four moons, which happens about every 2.7 years.
#Lunar eclipse time michigan how to#
WATCH: How to visit Mars with a tiny satellite, static electricity and ion thrusters With this definition our next blue moon is in March, leaving February with no full moon this year.

We already had one on the first of this month and our second will be Jan. With most months longer than 29.5 days, it occasionally works out that we have two full moons. Since there are 29.5 days between two full moons, we usually only end up with one per month. The first is any time a second full moon occurs in a single month. There are two different definitions of blue moon. 31 full moon is also a considered a blue moon. Blue light is filtered out, leaving the moon looking reddish during an eclipse.

In the case of a lunar eclipse, the sunlight that makes it around Earth passes through our atmosphere and is refracted toward the moon. Photo by NASA Goddard Space Flight Center During a sunset, the angle of the sun is lower in the sky and that red light instead passes directly into your eyes while the blue light is scattered away from your line of sight.Ī super blood moon tinted red by scattered light. When the sun is high in the sky, red light passes straight through to the ground while blue light is scattered in every direction, making it more likely to hit your eye when you look around. This is why we have blue skies and red sunrises and sunsets. The gas molecules of Earth’s atmosphere scatter bluer wavelengths of light from the sun, while redder wavelengths pass straight through. When the moon is all the way in shadow it doesn’t go completely dark instead, it looks red due to a process called Rayleigh scattering. When a lunar eclipse happens, the moon appears to darken as it moves into the Earth’s shadow called the umbra. The next one visible in North America will be on Jan. But don’t worry if you miss it, lunar eclipses happen on average a couple times a year. To see the phenomenon, you need to be on the night side of the Earth this eclipse will be visible mostly in Asia, Australia, the Pacific and North America. A lunar eclipse happens when the moon is completely in the Earth’s shadow.
