The Best Way To Watch the "Blood Moon" Tonight

An anonymous reader writes "People on the West Coast should be able to watch the beginning of the upcoming total lunar eclipse tonight at 10:20 pm. The entirety of the moon surface will be in Earth's shadow and start to glow red a couple hours later, a little after midnight. From the article: 'A lunar eclipse occurs when the sun, moon, and Earth align so that Earth's shadow falls across the moon's surface. Monday night's lunar eclipse is a total eclipse, which means Earth's shadow will cover the moon completely. The moon won't be blacked out by our planet's shadow. Instead, it will take on a reddish hue — anywhere from a bright copper to the brownish red of dried blood.'"

Comments

What time zone is the 10:20 PM?

[Streetlight]

I love it when information gives the time of day but not the time zone. Is this 10:20 PM in Eastern Australia or U. S. EDT or what?

Re:What time zone is the 10:20 PM?

[Anubis IV]

The article makes it clear that it's PDT, but even without reading the article, the fact that the link is to the LA Times and the summary is talking about the "West Coast" should have been a good indication of the time zone in question.

I'm going to have an excellent seat

[wwphx]

I'll be watching the eclipse from the catwalk of a 3.5 meter telescope while said telescope shoots a laser at the moon and bounces the beam off of five retroreflectors. Weather permitting. It's awesome having a wife who's an astronomer/PhD.

Re:I'm going to have an excellent seat

[Anonymous Coward]

And light has no mass! How does it bounce off mirrors? OMG!

A contender for "dumbest headline ever"

[wonkey_monkey]

The Best Way To Watch the "Blood Moon" Tonight

...is with your eyes, at the appropriate time. Don't bother looking earlier; it won't have happened yet! Similarly, if you try to catch the eclipse after it's finished, you'll just see an ordinary full moon.

Get it? Got it? Good.

Re:Trembling in fear.

[Anonymous Coward]

Any Christian pastor that claims to know the time of the end of the world hasn't read their Bible carefully enough.

"Heaven and earth will pass away, but my words will not pass away. However, no one knows the day or hour when these things will happen, not even the angels in heaven or the Son himself. Only the Father knows."

- Mark 13:31-32

Re:Stop calling it 'blood moon'!

[jaymz666]

Suddenly, it's been called a blood moon for quite some time...

Trollolololol!

[Anonymous Coward]

What annoys me is that this is happening on a weeknight. Seriously??? Can't anyone think this sort of thing through??? The majority of interested parties have either work or school the next day.

We need to petition to get these events to happen on weekends, so people can stay up late for them without severe disruption of their lives.

Re:Stop calling it 'blood moon'!

[schneidafunk]

Indeed it does originate from a long time ago. There's this quote from the bible, Joel 2:31 (Common English Bible):
" The sun will be turned to darkness, and the moon to blood before the great and dreadful day of the LORD comes.".

Or it could also be a reference to the folklore name 'red moon'. Every full moon has a 'cutsie, abstract, or dramatic name' which predates modern astronomy.
http://earthsky.org/astronomy-...

Re:The Best Way To View The Blood Moon

[geekoid]

How about you go outside, look around, and see if anyone is selling a sarcasm detector?