Simultaneous supermoon, lunar eclipse make for stunning photos

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This article was published 27/09/2015 (3866 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

 

The night skies brought a feast for the eyes on Sunday night.

Observers saw a total lunar eclipse (also called a blood moon) and a supermoon occur at the same time — something the world hasn’t seen in over three decades.

A blood moon happens during a total lunar eclipse when the moon takes on a reddish hue, while a supermoon occurs when the moon looks slightly larger because it is at its closest point to Earth in its orbit.

“I’ve never been to this event and I really wanted to see the red moon. It’s really cool (that it’s called a blood moon),” said Max Gillman, 6. He and his sister Maisie, 4, came to Assiniboine Park with their parents Deb and Mark.

Max and Maisie looked at the moon through one of about 30 giant telescopes set up in the park by members of the Winnipeg branch of the Royal Astronomical Society.

“I could see it started to get covered and I could see it started to get red already,” Max said.

The last time a lunar eclipse and supermoon occurred at the same time was in 1982 and it won’t happen again until 2033, a post on the NASA website said.

A total lunar eclipse, which could be seen in Winnipeg just after 9 p.m., happens when the full moon passes through the darkest part of Earth’s shadow, blocking out the direct light of the sun. NASA said the moon is called a blood moon during a lunar eclipse because the moon looks red from indirect light from the sun still reaching the moon. That light passes through the Earth’s atmosphere first, so almost all colours are filtered out except red.

Everyone who lined up got a turn to look through the big lens and get a close-up view of the moon as it became more ghostly with the shadow creeping across it.

“Cool. I know the moon is going to be covered for a while and it’s going to turn into the blood moon so I really wanted to see that,” said Hunter McKellep, 9, who came to Assiniboine Park with his dad John McKellep and his grandmother Terry McKellep.

“For me and my husband, we moved here to be with our children for a couple of years from up north so everything that happens, we do it all together,” said Terry, who moved to Winnipeg from The Pas.

There’s a wonderful global community aspect to the eclipse, said Scott Young, astronomer and manager of science communication and visitor experiences at the Manitoba Museum.

“It’s called the blood moon because the only light that reaches the moon during the lunar eclipse is the light from all the sunrises and all the sunsets from around the world at that one moment,” Young said. “So basically it’s that glorious reddish orange colour that you get that makes it the blood moon.”

The supermoon moniker comes from the fact that on Sunday night, the moon looked 14 per cent larger because it was at its closest point to the Earth during its orbit. The orbit of the moon is not a perfect circle so sometimes the moon is a bit closer and sometimes a bit farther from the Earth.

The moon was about 48,000 kilometres closer to Earth, but it was still 354,000 kilometres away.

“It’s really important to be able to come out and see it again. This is the last of four. The last one we got, it was overcast so this one is really nice,” said Dennis Lyons, an Astronomical Society member. He was referring to this lunar eclipse being the final one in a lunar tetrad, a series of four total eclipses separated by about six months. In this tetrad, the previous three total lunar eclipses took place on April 15 and Oct. 8 in 2014, and April 4, 2015.

“This is the last one we’re going to be able to see from Winnipeg for a while so it sure is nice to see so many people here. It’s an easy thing for the public to come out to see and really enjoy what we do,” Lyons said.

NASA said there won’t be another lunar tetrad until 2032-33.

ashley.prest@freepress.mb.ca