{"id":843,"date":"2019-01-09T13:21:38","date_gmt":"2019-01-09T16:21:38","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/projects.upei.ca\/astronomy\/?p=843"},"modified":"2019-01-20T21:28:07","modified_gmt":"2019-01-21T00:28:07","slug":"total-lunar-eclipse-january-20-21-2019","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/projects.upei.ca\/astronomy\/2019\/01\/09\/total-lunar-eclipse-january-20-21-2019\/","title":{"rendered":"Total Lunar Eclipse, January 20-21, 2019"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>During the night of January 20-21, 2019, the Moon will move into Earth&#8217;s shadow &#8211; an event known as a lunar eclipse. From our viewing perspective on PEI, we will see the Moon be completely covered by the darkest part of the Earth&#8217;s shadow (the &#8220;umbra&#8221;) and so we will see a &#8220;total&#8221; lunar eclipse.<\/p>\n<div style=\"width: 610px\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/upload.wikimedia.org\/wikipedia\/commons\/thumb\/9\/9f\/Lunar_Total_Eclipse_on_July_27%2C_2018_%28100_2006%29_%2843696968392%29_%28cropped%29.jpg\/600px-Lunar_Total_Eclipse_on_July_27%2C_2018_%28100_2006%29_%2843696968392%29_%28cropped%29.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"600\" height=\"600\" \/><p class=\"wp-caption-text\">When a total lunar eclipse reaches maximum, the Moon often appears red, as illustrated in this photo of a total lunar eclipse on July 27, 2018, photographed by Giuseppe Donatiello of Italy.<\/p><\/div>\n<p>When the Moon is in the darkest part of Earth&#8217;s shadow, some sunlight reaches the Moon after travelling through Earth&#8217;s atmosphere. The blue light gets scattered by the atmosphere so mostly only the red light reaches the Moon&#8217;s surface. This reddish appearance is while a total lunar eclipse is sometimes called a &#8220;Blood Moon&#8221;. If you&#8217;d like to learn more about what happens during a lunar eclipse, watch the video below from RASC or read about <a href=\"https:\/\/earthsky.org\/astronomy-essentials\/why-isnt-there-an-eclipse-every-full-moon\">why there isn&#8217;t a lunar eclipse every full Moon<\/a> and <a href=\"https:\/\/earthsky.org\/space\/why-does-the-moon-look-red-during-a-total-lunar-eclipse\">why the Moon appears red during a lunar eclipse<\/a> on EarthSky.org.<\/p>\n<p><iframe loading=\"lazy\" width=\"584\" height=\"329\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/eyvMuWFelf4?feature=oembed\" frameborder=\"0\" allow=\"accelerometer; autoplay; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe><\/p>\n<p>Lunar eclipses are a slow event and they don&#8217;t require any special equipment to view them, so they&#8217;re a good opportunity to so some backyard astronomy. Unlike a solar eclipse, a lunar eclipse is completely safe to view with the naked eye. If you have binoculars, you may enjoy using them to look at the Moon&#8217;s features more closely, especially at the edge of the Earth&#8217;s shadow. If you want to photograph the eclipse, read some tips <a href=\"https:\/\/www.timeanddate.com\/eclipse\/lunar-eclipse-photography.html\">here<\/a>. Since this eclipse will be happening in the middle of a January night on PEI, your preparations should include dressing very warmly and perhaps a nap earlier in the day.<\/p>\n<p>The website TimeAndDate.com provides a <a href=\"https:\/\/www.timeanddate.com\/eclipse\/in\/canada\/charlottetown?iso=20190121\">handy timeline of the eclipse and an animation of what it will look like from Charlottetown<\/a>. Although the eclipse technically begins at 10:36pm, the first &#8220;penumbral&#8221; phase is very difficult to see (because the Moon is only in the lighter part of the Earth&#8217;s shadow, called the &#8220;penumbra&#8221;). When the darker part of Earth&#8217;s shadow starts moving across the Moon at 11:33pm, it will be easily visible as you&#8217;ll see the Moon&#8217;s surface grow increasingly dark. By 12:41am, the Moon will be completely in the Earth&#8217;s shadow and will appear to have a reddish tint. This &#8220;total&#8221; phase of the eclipse will last until 1:43am. After that, until 2:50am, you can watch the Earth&#8217;s shadow move away from the Moon. So even if it&#8217;s partly cloudy on the night of the eclipse, each phase lasts long enough that you could possibly watch the eclipse when there&#8217;s clear breaks between clouds. If it&#8217;s completely overcast, you can watch the eclipse online (you might want to just pop into the live feed now and then because it&#8217;s not a fast, dramatic event). Live feeds will be offered by the <a href=\"https:\/\/www.virtualtelescope.eu\/webtv\/\">Virtual Telescope Project<\/a> and <a href=\"https:\/\/www.timeanddate.com\/live\/\">timeanddate.com<\/a>, among others.<\/p>\n<p>If you have any eclipse questions or would like to share your stories or photos of your viewing experience, we&#8217;d enjoy hearing from you. You can find us on <a href=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/AstronomyUPEI\">Facebook<\/a> or <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/UPEIAstronomy\">Twitter.<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>During the night of January 20-21, 2019, the Moon will move into Earth&#8217;s shadow &#8211; an event known as a lunar eclipse. From our viewing perspective on PEI, we will see the Moon be completely covered by the darkest part &hellip; <a href=\"https:\/\/projects.upei.ca\/astronomy\/2019\/01\/09\/total-lunar-eclipse-january-20-21-2019\/\">Continue reading <span class=\"meta-nav\">&rarr;<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":53,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[6],"tags":[],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/projects.upei.ca\/astronomy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/843"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/projects.upei.ca\/astronomy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/projects.upei.ca\/astronomy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/projects.upei.ca\/astronomy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/53"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/projects.upei.ca\/astronomy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=843"}],"version-history":[{"count":6,"href":"https:\/\/projects.upei.ca\/astronomy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/843\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":857,"href":"https:\/\/projects.upei.ca\/astronomy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/843\/revisions\/857"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/projects.upei.ca\/astronomy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=843"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/projects.upei.ca\/astronomy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=843"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/projects.upei.ca\/astronomy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=843"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}