November's full moon on Nov. 30 will undergo a penumbral lunar eclipse, two days after reaching aphelion, when the moon is farthest from Earth. According to the Old Farmer's Almanac, the November full phase is called the Full Beaver Moon, as it is when beavers usually went into their lodges for winter.
Lunar calendar for 2020
| New Moon | First Quarter | Full Moon |
|---|
| Apr. 22, 22:26 p.m. | Apr. 30, 4:38 p.m. | May 7, 6:45 a.m. |
| May 22, 1:39 pm. | May 29, 11:30 pm. | Jun. 5, 3:12 p.m. |
| Jun. 21, 2:41 a.m. | Jun. 28, 4:16 p.m. | Jul. 5, 12:44 a.m. |
| Jul. 20, 1:33 p.m. | Jul. 27, 8:32 a.m. | Aug. 3, 11:59 a.m. |
The next full Moon will be on Tuesday night, April 7. It's also a "supermoon," the largest of the full Moons this year. The Moon will be full on Tuesday night, April 7, 2020, appearing opposite the Sun (in Earth-based longitude) at 10:35 PM EDT.
Oakland's Chabot Space and Science Center staff astronomer Ben Burress said the moon will darken and turn a "rusty orange, red or coppery" color. This natural phenomenon will occur around midnight in the Bay Area when the sun, Earth and a full moon are in line.
Moon Phases for Los Angeles, California, USA in 2020
| Lunation | New Moon |
|---|
| 1209 | Sep 17 | 4:00 am |
| 1210 | Oct 16 | 12:31 pm |
| 1211 | Nov 14 | 9:07 pm |
| 1212 | Dec 14 | 8:16 am |
Orange and red light, which have longer wavelengths, tend to pass through the atmosphere, while shorter wavelengths of light, such as blue, get scattered. That's why the Moon — and the Sun! If you've ever seen an orange Moon high in the sky, the atmosphere is still the reason it's orange.
See it at its fullest and brightest tonight (May 6) with your own eyes or a live webcast. The full moon arrives just 32 hours after the moon reached perigee, or the closest approach to Earth in its orbit. That makes this a "supermoon," according to NASA.
July's full moon is known as the Buck Moon because it occurs around the time when young male deer grow their antlers. But it's also graced with many other nicknames by different cultures including “Thunder Moon,” “Hay Moon,” “Mead Moon,” “Rose Moon,” 'Elk Moon and 'Summer Moon.”
"The moon keeps the same face pointing towards the Earth because its rate of spin is tidally locked so that it is synchronized with its rate of revolution (the time needed to complete one orbit). In other words, the moon rotates exactly once every time it circles the Earth.
A “gibbous” moon is any moon that appears more than half lighted but less than full. The word gibbous comes from a root word that means hump-backed. People often see a waxing gibbous moon in the afternoon, shortly after moonrise, while it's ascending in the east as the sun is descending in the west.
The time between one full moon and the next is close to the length of a calendar month. So the only time one month can have two full moons is when the first full moon happens in the first few days of the month. This happens every two to three years, so these sorts of Blue Moons come about that often.
When half of the Moon's disc is illuminated, we call it the first quarter moon. This name comes from the fact that the Moon is now one-quarter of the way through the lunar month. From Earth, we are now looking at the sunlit side of the Moon from off to the side. The Moon continues to wax.
As the Sun sets, the Moon rises with the side that faces Earth fully exposed to sunlight (5). The Moon has phases because it orbits Earth, which causes the portion we see illuminated to change. The Moon takes 27.3 days to orbit Earth, but the lunar phase cycle (from new Moon to new Moon) is 29.5 days.
It's true that the moon goes around Earth every month, but it doesn't always get in Earth's shadow. The moon's path around Earth is tilted compared to Earth's orbit around the sun. The moon can be behind Earth but still get hit by light from the sun. Unlike solar eclipses, lots of people get to see each lunar eclipse.
Only one side of the Moon is visible from Earth because the Moon rotates on its axis at the same rate that the Moon orbits the Earth – a situation known as synchronous rotation, or tidal locking. The Moon is directly illuminated by the Sun, and the cyclically varying viewing conditions cause the lunar phases.
Waning Crescent (Surrender) Scientifically: The fraction of the moon that is illuminated is decreasing on its way to becoming a new moon. Spiritually: Surrender, rest, recuperate. You may feel empty during this time.
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- First comes the earliest sunset, in early December.
- Then there's the winter solstice half a month later on December 21 in the Northern Hemisphere, the day with the fewest minutes of daylight.
- Finally, another two weeks later, in early January, we get our murkiest morning—the latest sunrise.
The solstice, which usually falls on Dec. 21 or 22, is technically not a full calendar day but an exact moment in time. It occurs when Earth's Northern Hemisphere is tilted farthest from the sun, bringing us our shortest daylight period and the lowest sun angle of the year.
A full Moon occurs when the Moon has moved in its orbit so that Earth is “between” the Moon and the Sun. Between the new and full Moon, the amount of Moon we see grows — or waxes from its right side toward its left side.
Usually, new moons occur only once a month, but because there's a slight disjunct between the moon's phases—a 29.5-day cycle, on average—and the Gregorian calendar, some months can have two new moons: one at the beginning and one at the end.
A new moon is when the Moon cannot be seen because we are looking at the unlit half of the Moon. A Full Moon is when we can see the entire lit portion of the Moon. The full moon phase occurs when the Moon is on the opposite side of the Earth from the Sun, called opposition.
When you stand looking at a waxing crescent moon, you're seeing a thin fraction of the moon's day side, or illuminated side, and a larger fraction of the moon's night side, the side of the moon submerged in the moon's own shadow. We see only a slender fraction of the day side: a crescent moon.
Those spots are called maria, from the Latin word for sea, because early astronomers mistakenly thought they were lunar seas (they're actually volcanic plains). The smooth and dark maria cover 17 percent of the surface of the moon. Almost all of them are visible from Earth.
Studies reveal that life on the moon is now possible, but only for Earth's toughest creatures who can survive extreme conditions. Their survival indicated that Earth's creatures that can withstand extreme temperatures and radiations can actually survive on the lunar surface too.
After monitoring and recording the volunteers' sleep patterns over a period of days, researchers found that, when there was a full moon, the volunteers on average took five minutes longer to fall asleep, slept for 20 minutes less, and were in a deep sleep for almost one-third less time than usual.
Daytime on one side of the moon lasts about 13 and a half days, followed by 13 and a half nights of darkness. When sunlight hits the moon's surface, the temperature can reach 260 degrees Fahrenheit (127 degrees Celsius). When the sun goes down, temperatures can dip to minus 280 F (minus 173 C).
When people say the "dark side" of the moon, they're most often referring to what is technically called the "far side" — where China just landed its Chang'e 4 spacecraft for the first time in history. Scientists call the face of the moon that we always see the "near side."
The light from the moon is light being reflected from the sun. The sun, in space, is white. But on Earth, when the light is filtered through an atmosphere, the light appears yellow.
Unlike a lamp or our sun, the moon doesn't produce its own light. Moonlight is actually sunlight that shines on the moon and bounces off. The light reflects off old volcanoes, craters, and lava flows on the moon's surface.
The Moon DOES look more yellow near the horizonThis happens because the Moon's light travels a longer distance through the atmosphere. As it travels a longer path, more of the shorter, bluer wavelengths of light are scattered away, leaving more of the longer, redder wavelengths.
Illumination. The intensity of moonlight varies greatly depending on the lunar phase, but even the full Moon typically provides only about 0.05–0.1 lux illumination.
