Early in the morning of Election Day, early risers will have the opportunity to watch the Beaver Moon undergo a total solar eclipse in November.
This will be the fourth and final lunar eclipse, which interestingly has occurred at biannual intervals from May last year through this year. Three of these eclipses in this series are total. One of them – last November 19th’s lunar eclipse – was partial, but close; except for about two percent, the Moon was immersed in Earth’s dark umbra (the darkest, innermost part of a shadow). Had last November’s eclipse registered as total, it would have resulted in four totalities spanning 2021 and 2022: a cycle known as the lunar eclipse tetrad.
The one coming our way next Tuesday morning favors the western half of North America and the Hawaiian Islands (where the Moon will appear almost directly overhead in the middle of the eclipse). Along the Atlantic coast, the moon will set as it begins to emerge from the total eclipse. For Central and East Asia, Indonesia, New Zealand and Australia, the solar eclipse will take place on Tuesday evening as the moon rises.
Related: Lunar Eclipses 2022: When, Where and How to See Them
Overall, Space.com estimates that 2.7 billion people will have the opportunity – weather permitting – to enjoy the best part of this lunar show. In other parts of the world, either only the partial stages of the eclipse are visible, or the eclipse occurs when it is day and the Moon is not above their local horizon.
This map and accompanying chart (opens in new tab) Representations of the Moon’s orbit through Earth’s shadow are courtesy of Eclipsewise.com. The schedule below shows what to expect at your location and when. Dashes indicate the moon has set and is below the horizon.
| Eclipse Event | European daylight saving time | CST | MST | PST |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Penumbra visible first? | 3:48 a.m | 2:48 a.m | 1:48 p.m | 12:48 a.m |
| The moon enters the umbra | 4:08 a.m | 3:08 a.m | 2:08 a.m | 1:08 am |
| The total solar eclipse begins | 5:16 a.m | 4:16 a.m | 3:16 a.m | 2:16 p.m |
| middle of the solar eclipse | 5:59 a.m | 4:59 a.m | 3:59 p.m | 2:59 p.m |
| Total solar eclipse ends | 6:41 a.m | 5:41 a.m | 4:41 a.m | 2:41 a.m |
| Moon leaves umbra | —- | —- | 5:49 a.m | 4:49 a.m |
| Penumbra last visible? | —- | —- | 6:09 a.m | 5:09 a.m |
Stages of the eclipse
A total lunar eclipse consists of five phases, each of which has different things to consider.
The first penumbral stage begins when the Moon’s leading edge enters the faint outer edge of Earth’s shadow, called the penumbra. But the shading is so faint that most people don’t notice anything until about 70% of the lunar disk is immersed in the penumbra; or about 20 minutes before first contact with the much darker umbra. Some people with exceptionally keen eyesight can discern the penumbra when the moon has entered about halfway through the penumbra, or about 30 minutes before it first touches the umbra. Notice a slight darkening on the upper left side of the moon. The penumbra shading (or “stain”) becomes more pronounced as the minutes tick down and the moon penetrates deeper.
The second stage is the partial solar eclipse. This begins much more dramatically as the Moon’s leading (left) edge enters the umbra, Earth’s inner shadow where direct sunlight doesn’t reach. With a telescope, you can watch as the umbra’s edge slowly engulfs craters, mountains, and lunar maria (the darker plains on the moon’s surface) as your local night sky slowly and progressively darkens. Note the Pleiades star cluster, which will be high above the Moon and will gain in importance as the eclipse progresses.
Just over an hour into the partial eclipse, only a last bright lunar stripe remains outside the umbra. And the rest of the moon is likely displaying an eerie reddish/copper glow. The contrast in light and color has led some to refer to this as the “Japanese Lantern Effect”.
Next comes the third stage: the total solar eclipse, which begins when the last edge of the moon slips into the umbra. Although the sun is completely hidden here, the moon is likely to glow a shade of red or orange. These hues are caused by sunlight sliding through and bending through the Earth’s atmosphere: it’s the combined light of all the sunrises and sunsets that envelop our world at any given moment. If an astronaut were on the moon, he or she would see the sun completely obscured and the dark disk of the earth (which appears almost four times larger than the moon to us) surrounded by a thin ring of red or orange light. And this light, in turn, falls on the surrounding lunar landscape.
Light or dark?
On rare occasions, such as in 1963 and 1992, the fully eclipsed moon turns almost black. On other occasions, like 1967 and 2003, it can appear as bright as a freshly minted penny. Sometimes it turns brown rather than a distinctive red or orange, and more closely resembles the color of a bar of milk chocolate.
Two factors determine the moon’s brightness and color during totality. The first is how deep the moon penetrates the umbra; The center of the umbra is much darker than its edges. For this upcoming eclipse, the moon will track north of the center of the umbra. At the midpoint of the eclipse, the moon’s lower rim will just brush the center of the umbra, but its upper rim will be hidden about 780 miles (1,250 kilometers) inside the outer rim of the umbra. The upper part of the lunar disc should therefore appear significantly brighter than the lower part.
The other factor is the state of the Earth’s atmosphere along the sunrise-sunset line. If the air is very clear, the eclipse will be bright. But if a recent large volcanic eruption has polluted the atmosphere with an aerosol cloud or thin global haze, the eclipse will be ashen gray or almost black. Agung volcano in Indonesia in 1963 and Pinatubo volcano in the Philippines in 1991 were the main reasons the lunar eclipses that followed their eruptions were so dark.
In addition, blue light refracted by Earth’s clear, ozone-rich upper atmosphere may also contribute to the scene, particularly near the edge of the umbra.
emerging from the shadows
As in May last year, totality will be unusually long at 85 minutes. And then, as the moon continues its orbit to the east, events repeat themselves in reverse order. The moon’s leading edge reappears in the sunlight, ending totality and beginning the fourth phase: another partial eclipse.
When the entire moon leaves the penumbra, only the final penumbral shade remains for level five. This final twilight slowly fades, leaving the brilliant full moon in mid-autumn to resume its normal form.
Also look for Uranus!
By a fortuitous coincidence, the planet Uranus appears at a magnitude of +5.6 during totality less than 2 degrees to the upper left of the Moon. Locate it with your binoculars or telescope by first aiming at the +6.3 magnitude yellow-white star HIP 13448, which appears about a degree above the upper left Moon during totality. Then continue a similar distance in the same direction until you come to another “star” that appears about twice as bright as HIP 13448. Except that won’t be a star, but the sixth planet outside the Sun. Can you see some of the aquamarine-green tint of Uranus? The contrast with the orange-red moon can make this color a bit more distinct.
And for some random locations: northwestern North America, Asia, Japan, and the arctic regions, the moon will actually occlude (hide) Uranus.
In a telescope, Uranus is a tiny disc 3.7 arc seconds wide. It is 1.74 billion miles (2.8 billion km) from Earth compared to the Moon’s 240,000 miles (387,000 km).
Joe Rao serves as an instructor and visiting professor at New York University Hayden Planetarium (opens in new tab). He writes on astronomy for Journal of Natural History (opens in new tab)the Peasant Almanac (opens in new tab) and other publications. Follow us on Twitter @spacedotcom (opens in new tab) and further Facebook (opens in new tab).
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