Early birds and night owls across the continent will see something special in the sky Wednesday: a rusty red moon setting while the sun comes up.
Canadians, especially those on the West Coast, will be treated to the second “blood moon” of the year early Wednesday morning. For about an hour, the Earth will float directly between the moon and the sun, casting a shadow across the face of the full moon.
Although the Earth will be in the way of the sun, the atmosphere’s distortion of sunlight will cast a clay-coloured glow over the moon between about 6:30 a.m. and 7:30 a.m. ET. The same effect turns the bottom of the blue sky shades of red, pink and orange as the sun sinks into the ground every day.
Atmospheric trickery will also yield something that appears to be impossible -- the moon and sun both briefly hanging above the horizon simultaneously.
Since the two will be sitting 180 degrees apart during the eclipse, those on Earth should only begin to see the sunrise after the moon disappears. But because the atmosphere refracts and bends light slightly, sky-gazers will be able to see the sun before it actually breaks the plane of the horizon.
The rare result is a phenomenon called a “selenelion” -- though it will only appear for a few minutes to those on the eastern half of the continent.
This month’s blood moon marks the second in a series of four total lunar eclipses over the course of a year and a half. Though lunar eclipses occur twice per year, in most cases, the moon is only partially obscured by the Earth’s shadow.
The first blood moon of the group occurred in April of this year, with the next two occurring in April and September of 2015. This “tetrad” of total eclipses will occur eight times this century, and not again for nearly 20 years.
To check when the eclipse is happening in your area, click here for a simulation of what the moon will look like throughout the night.
