Moon show: Full harvest blood eclipse supermoon Tuesday night

Clear your calendar for Tuesday evening, Minnesota. A rare sky show is on the way.

Here’s what’s up with Tuesday’s full harvest blood eclipse supermoon.

Full moon

Tuesday’s full moon occurs Sept. 17, 2024, at 9:35 PM CDT according to NASA. The moon will appear full for about three days, from Monday evening through Thursday morning.

Harvest moon

The full moon closest to the autumnal equinox is the harvest moon. The autumnal equinox occurs Sunday at 1:44 PM CDT. Here’s more from NASA on the harvest moon:

The first known written use of this name in the English language (per the Oxford English Dictionary) was in 1706. During the fall harvest season farmers sometimes need to work late into the night by moonlight. On average moonrise is about 50 minutes later each night. Around the Harvest Moon this time is shorter, about 25 minutes for the latitude of Washington, DC, and only 10 to 20 minutes farther north in Canada and Europe.

Supermoon

This will be a supermoon. Supermoons are closer to Earth and can appear as much as 14 percent bigger and up to 30 percent brighter!

Here’s more from NASA on supermoons.

This will be a supermoon. The term "supermoon" was coined by astrologer Richard Nolle in 1979 as either a new or full Moon that occurs when the Moon is within 90% of its closest to Earth. Since we can't see new Moons, what has the public's attention are full supermoons, the biggest and brightest Moons of the year. Although different publications use different thresholds for deciding which full Moons qualify, most agree this will be the second of four consecutive supermoons (effectively tied with the full Moon in October for the closest of the year).

Partial lunar eclipse

You’ll notice a small bite out of the top of the moon Tuesday night. That’s due to partial lunar eclipse. Again NASA is the best source of detail here. (I’ve converted times from EDT to CDT.)

This will be a partial lunar eclipse. The Moon will start entering the Earth's partial shadow at 7:41 PM CDT. The slight dimming of the Moon will be difficult to notice until the top edge of the Moon starts entering the full shadow at 9:13 PM. The peak of the eclipse will be at 9:44 PM with only the top 8 percent of the Moon in full shadow. The Moon will finish exiting the full shadow at 10:16 PM and the partial shadow at 11:47 AM.

Blood moon

Finally light that passes through the earth’s atmosphere will cast a reddish pall over the moon. That’s why it’s called a blood moon.

Here’s how Earth’s atmosphere scattered out other light waves leaving the red waves to pass through.

NPR has some good detail on the blood moon here.

The best times to view the event will depend on your location, but the lunar eclipse will peak at 9:44 p.m. CT, according to NASA. All of North and South America will have a chance to see the partial lunar eclipse and harvest supermoon depending on the weather. Europe and Africa will also have an opportunity to see the eclipse.

This lunar eclipse will be a partial one, with only the upper portion of the moon being plunged into the darkest part of the Earth's shadow known as the umbra, Monsue said.

“Aside from the small darkened portion at the top of the moon's disk, most of the visible lunar disk will be in Earth's penumbra, the lighter portion of the planet's shadow that does not entirely block the sun's light,” she also said, adding that this will give most of the moon a reddish-brown appearance that we call a “blood moon.”

Partly cloudy skies

Skies look mostly clear to partly cloudy across Minnesota Tuesday evening. Here’s NOAA’s FV3 model cloud cover output for 10 p.m. Tuesday.

Here are some great native American moon names from NASA.

The Maine Farmer's Almanac first published "Indian" names for the full Moons in the 1930s and these names have become widely known and used. According to this almanac, as the full Moon in September the Algonquin tribes in what is now the northeastern USA called this the Corn Moon, as this was the time for gathering their main staple crops of corn, pumpkins, squash, beans, and wild rice. Other European names for this full Moon are the Fruit Moon, as a number of fruits ripen as the end of summer approaches, and the Barley Moon, from the harvesting and threshing of barley.

Get out there and enjoy the show!