The first full moon after the autumn equinox is called the Hunter’s Moon, and a blood moon.
The full moon on October 8 will also be a total lunar eclipse– a blood moon. It is the second of four blood moons, a lunar tetrad. The first of these eclipsed full moons occurred on April 15 of this year. You can read more about it here. The next lunar eclipse in the series will occur on April 4, 2015, and the last in the tetrad will appear on September 28, 2015.
Weather permitting, the total lunar eclipse on Wednesday October 8 will be visible in much of North America, as well as Australia, Western Asia and across the Pacific Ocean.
Here is the weather outlook for North America, from accuweather–
Weather outlook for tomorrow morning’s eclipse, via accuweather. Eclipse details: http://t.co/1DuPr21H3v pic.twitter.com/uyimxyeKLc
— EarthSky (@earthskyscience) October 7, 2014
The total part of the October 8 eclipse lasts nearly 1 hour. The partial eclipse that precedes totality lasts about one hour and 10 minutes. It also follows totality and lasts about an hour and 10 minutes. The moon takes more than 3 hours to completely pass through the Earth’s dark shadow.
According to wikipedia–
A selenelion or selenehelion occurs when both the Sun and the eclipsed Moon can be observed at the same time. This can only happen just before sunset or just after sunrise, and both bodies will appear just above the horizon at nearly opposite points in the sky. This arrangement has led to the phenomenon being referred to as a horizontal eclipse. There are typically a number of high ridges undergoing sunrise or sunset that can see it. Indeed, the reddened light that reaches the Moon comes from all the simultaneous sunrises and sunsets on the Earth. Although the Moon is in the Earth’s umbra, the Sun and the eclipsed Moon can both be seen at the same time because the refraction of light through the Earth’s atmosphere causes each of them to appear higher in the sky than their true geometric position.
You can also view the eclipse online at Slooh.com. The live, real-time broadcast will begin on October 8th starting at 2:00 AM PDT / 5:00 AM EDT / 0900 UTC . There will be live feeds from multiple locations in Australia and North America.
NASA will also have online coverage. You can also find out more at EarthSky.com and Space.com.
So why not make a night of it? From sunset to sunrise, the full Hunter’s Moon will be a sight to see.
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Tags: blood moon, lunar eclipse, selenelion
Beautifully done -- and so convincing that you might even turn me into a morning person (just once).
Thanks for reading. There should be fabulous view by the lake...
Maybe I will get to see it..if I am up going to the bathroom! Great post.
I'm setting my alarm, but maybe I won't need it!