In the early hours of Wednesday, May 26, a total lunar eclipse will be visible in North America for the first time in nearly two and a half years.But will we see the moon in Beaufort?
It’s set to be a very rare lunar trifecta; a supermoon, a blood moon and a full moon all at one time, but what you see will depend entirely on where you are in the U.S.
The total eclipse will only be visible in the Western U.S. but the Eastern part of the country, including Beaufort SC, will get to enjoy a partial eclipse.
Lunar eclipses occur when the moon is on the opposite side of the Earth as the sun. Usually we see a full moon when this happens, but every so often the moon enters the Earth’s shadow, resulting in an eclipse. This doesn’t happen every full moon because the plane of the moon’s orbit is tilted about 5 degrees from the plane of the Earth’s orbit, and the moon “misses” the shadow of the Earth.
This lunar eclipse will appear slightly larger than normal because the moon will reach perigee, the closest point in its orbit to Earth, on May 25 at 9:21pm EDT.
When the full moon and perigee are close, it is called a “supermoon” — though definitions aren’t consistent as it isn’t an astronomical term.
Ordinarily the moon is an average of 240,000 miles (384,500 kilometers) from Earth, but its orbit isn’t perfectly circular. So the distance varies slightly. When it reaches perigee this month, the moon will be 222,022 miles (357,311 km) from Earth.
The eclipse will start at 4:47:39 a.m. EDT (08:47:39 GMT), according to NASA’s Eclipse Page.
So next Tuesday evening, look up in the night sky above Beaufort….we may be in for a real treat.
