Those of us used to getting up in the early morning hours will be in for a bit of a treat this Wednesday morning.
January 31 will be the date of the rather rare occurrence – a Super Blue Blood Moon.
A “supermoon” is when a full moon occurs at the same time as its perigee, the closest point of the moon’s orbit with Earth. The result: the moon appears larger than normal and NASA is predicting this one will be 14% brighter than usual.
The “Blue” part of the equation refers to the rare instance when there is a second full moon in a calendar month.
LISTEN: All you need to know about tomorrow’s Super Blue Blood Moon
And the “Blood” part? That’s the moment during a lunar eclipse when the moon, in the Earth’s shadow, takes on a reddish tint.
Viewing should be rather good for those of us in the western part of North America, but you’ll need to get up early to see the phenomenon – The eclipse begins at 3:51 AM MT, as the Moon is about to set in the western sky, and the sky is getting lighter in the east.”
NASA will Live Stream the event here: https://www.nasa.gov/nasalive