Get ready to see an amazing sight in the night sky, and you don’t even need any special equipment like a telescope. On Sunday night, there will be a total lunar eclipse that will be visible throughout most of the United States. You should be able to see it if you look up at the sky at just the right time as long as there isn’t too much cloud cover in your location.
Sunday night’s lunar eclipse will be the first of two lunar eclipses in 2022. This particular lunar eclipse is known as the Super Flower Blood Moon. Let’s break down that name.
According to The Old Farmer’s Almanac, a super moon is “any full Moon that occurs when the Moon is at at least 90% of perigee (the point in the Moon’s orbit where it is closest to Earth).” This moon is also known as the Flower Moon because it occurs in May, and the flower name is a nod to the season when flowers are in bloom. As far as the name Blood Moon, this isn’t anything creepy. It simply refers to the color of the moon. This particular moon will be a full lunar eclipse, and that gives the moon a reddish glow.
During a lunar eclipse, the moon is in the Earth’s shadow which means the Earth is blocking the light from the sun from hitting the moon. You might think this might cause the moon to temporarily disappear, but that’s not the case. Instead, while the moon usually glows white due to the sun hitting it, when the moon is in Earth’s shadow, the moon has a reddish glow.
The lunar eclipse will start at night on Sunday May 15 and last until early in the morning on Monday May 16, 2022. The lunar eclipse will start around 9:30pm Eastern time, 6:30pm Pacific time, but the best time to view it is around 12:11am Monday morning Eastern time or 9:11pm Sunday night Pacific time. The eclipse won’t completely end until 2:52am Monday morning Eastern time or 11:52pm Sunday night Pacific time.
Watch the video below to learn more about this lunar eclipse including what you do and do not need in order to have the best view.
Do you plan to watch the lunar eclipse? Are you going to wake your children up to watch this lunar eclipse?