On the night of September 7th to the morning of September 8th, a spectacular total lunar eclipse occurred in the night sky in various locations around the world, displaying the unique phenomenon of a “blood moon”. The exciting part is that as long as the weather is clear, this rare astronomical spectacle can be observed with the naked eye.
The lunar eclipse happens when the sun, earth, and moon align perfectly in a straight line, causing the moon to enter the earth’s shadow. When the moon completely enters the core shadow of the earth, known as the “umbra”, a total lunar eclipse occurs. During this period, the earth blocks out most of the sunlight, especially colors with shorter wavelengths like blue and violet. However, colors with longer wavelengths like red and orange are more likely to pass through the earth’s atmosphere and reach the moon, causing the moon to appear orange-red or copper-red, hence the name “blood moon”.
The intensity of the red color of the moon is closely related to the amount of dust or clouds in the earth’s atmosphere during the lunar eclipse – the more clouds or dust, the deeper the red color of the moon.
According to the Taipei Observatory forecast, the “blood moon” total lunar eclipse lasted a total of 5 hours and 30 minutes, with the visible darkening and partial eclipse of the moon called “umbra” starting at 12:27 AM on the early morning of the 8th and concluding with the re-emergence at 3:57 AM. The total eclipse phase when the moon turns into a reddish-copper color, known as the “red moon” (the most exciting part), lasted for 1 hour and 23 minutes.
This lunar eclipse was visible in Europe, Asia, Australia, Africa, western parts of North America, eastern parts of South America, the Indian Ocean, the Arctic, and Antarctica.