Lunar Eclipse - Tomorrow

V_Moth

Surprised not to see a thread on this already. There is a lunar eclipse happening tomorrow morning:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/April_2014_lunar_eclipse

Unfortunately Ireland is well to the east of the main area where the eclipse is visible, though based on this animation (http://www.timeanddate.com/eclipse/in/ireland/cork) it should be possible to see at least the start of the eclipse at around 6am tomorrow morning before the moon dips down below the horizon.

At least it looks like the weather should relatively good for viewing overnight.

jArgHA

Thanks for the heads up. I think it may be 7am however when we start to see things happen - the 6am listed on the Wikipedia page is UTC, aka Universal Time. This never changes in winter or summer, and as a result to get the Daylight Savings Time (which is in effect now), you need to add an hour.

I could be wrong, but I think that makes it around a 7am start for us. This is far from ideal, since this will be after sunrise, so the moon be harder to see as it sets in the west.

mickmackey1

The only part of the eclipse which occurs over Ireland is the penumbral stage, which is more or less invisible. So this eclipse is a non-event for us.

Red Nissan

It does not show up on Stellarium either.

M.T. Cranium

The OP should read that Ireland is to the east of the favourable viewing zone which extends across the Atlantic and North America into parts of the Pacific Ocean. I would have an ideal view here except for some increasing high cloud but perhaps I will at least see some indication of the event at midnight local time. Best chances to view the event will be around Alberta and Saskatchewan, many other regions of North America will be overcast tonight due to a sprawling complex of low pressure areas from near the Great Lakes region to the Gulf of Mexico.

You may find some live webcam coverage available from locations in western Canada. The local time in Alberta for example will be 0100 to 0230.

The exact time of full moon is listed in the Astronomical Almanac as 0742z which is 0842 IST. That means that the total eclipse will run from about 0800 to 0930h with the moon having set so as somebody already mentioned above, only the early penumbral stage might be visible if you can find the setting moon in daylight and watch through binoculars perhaps.

Not a total loss however, you could check out the proximity of the Moon to Mars tonight, and also see if you can pick out Spica, a fairly bright star that will be appearing close to the Moon's south pole at eclipse time. As seen from ireland around midnight, the Moon should be about mid-way between these two bright objects (Mars is considerably brighter). And if you're looking at that time, check the southeast sky and the brightest "star" there will be the planet Saturn. Jupiter will be very prominent in the southwest at the same time. Venus becomes visible closer to sunrise and is currently very bright around 0430-0600h before dawn (earlier at high latitudes).

V_Moth

M.T. Cranium wrote: »

The OP should read that Ireland is to the east of the favourable viewing zone ...

D'oh! Updated the post..

Oscar Bravo

Nice clear skies about should provide excellent viewing of the ISS pass at 2148 and later at 2325. the first pass will be a bright one.

Calibos

Even if Ireland were in a reasonably favourable position I try not to get my hopes up about anything astronomical in this country.

Got up very early for the Venus Transit and met up with people on Bray Head at 5am to view. Jokingly said, "Murphy forecasts that the cloud cover will clear within 5 minutes after the transit is over"

It was actually literally 30 seconds.

It is always thus in this country.

One has to be somewhat of a masochist to be an amateur astronomer in this country.

With the ISS your always bound to get some clear skies at least one or two nights in the 2 week viewing windows when they come round. Anything astronomical that has a viewing window measured in days or hours generally means cloudy mac cloudsterville.

I was flabbergasted a few years ago when we had clear skies for the once/twice a decade Irish Dusk/Dawn Shuttle Launch Flyovers measured in a minute or two. Generally even if the orbital insertion angle had it fly over Ireland on its way up it was during our daylight hours or full night time. On rare occasions though the launch time and trajectory would put the flyovers over us at dawn/dusk as was the case about 4 or 5 years ago. Now that was a sight to see. Much Brighter and faster than the ISS because the shuttle was much lower in altitude combined with the Very visibly bright orange fuel tank just jettisoned traveling behind the shuttle was simply spectacular. Much more visceral experience as one had just watched the launch from Cape Canaveral in Florida on the other side of the world on TV 18 minutes previously. It moved so fast across the sky and I imagined the astronauts strapped to their seats still under heavy G's with Meat Loafs 'Bat outta Hell' playing in the background Then to think that the Visible Orange jettisoned fuel tank already falling away wouldn't make oceanfall till over the pacific near New Zealand. It was pretty amazing sight.

mickmackey1

This is what it looked like from Nevada, lucky Yanks

redsteveireland

Observed the huge, full moon while driving into Galway this morning at 6:20 before it disappeared below the horizon. Amazing sight with the red/orange sky behind me. No pictures as I was driving.

youtube!

There was a huge red moon tonight in co meath, why was this so? Absolutely amazing sight. I am not joking btw. Oh and before anyone says it the sun had set so it wasn't that, definitely the moon and very much red in colour.

Super-Rush

youtube! wrote: »

There was a huge red moon tonight in co meath, why was this so? Absolutely amazing sight. I am not joking btw. Oh and before anyone says it the sun had set so it wasn't that, definitely the moon and very much red in colour.

Friend in Galway said the same and i saw the same red/dark orange moon in Carlow.

fran38

Super-Rush wrote: »

Friend in Galway said the same and i saw the same red/dark orange moon in Carlow.

Look up "Four blood moons" by John Hagee.

youtube!

fran38 wrote: »

Look up "Four blood moons" by John Hagee.

Oh dear that's a bit freaky :eek:

Rikand

Probably more suited to the religious forum -I found another link written by some hebrew guy which comes across much more rational!

http://www.answersingenesis.org/articles/2013/07/12/lunar-eclipses-cause-blood-moons


nathin to worry about except that 2014/2015 is going to be very interesting for moon stuff for all of us

M.T. Cranium

Would suggest that the red full moons reported a day after the eclipse were due to high-level dust, smoke or other pollutants imported from Europe given the current southeast flow.

I was disappointed to find a thick overcast at eclipse time here, with no view of the event, then it cleared up again just afterwards.