A Guide To Friday's Comet-Eclipse-Full-Moon Triple Feature (cnet.com) 28
SonicSpike quotes a report from CNET: Even if you aren't a space nerd whose idea of a good time is craning your neck to stare into the vast nothingness of space on a frigid evening, this Friday the heavens will put on a show worth heading outdoors for. A penumbral lunar eclipse, a full "snow moon" and a comet will be spicing up the night sky February 10 in a rare convergence of such celestial happenings. We'll start with our nearest neighbor. February brings the full moon known as the "snow moon" because this month in North America tends to see a lot of the white fluffy stuff. This snow moon will be special though because, well... we'll all get in its way in a sense when the penumbral lunar eclipse takes place Friday. The eclipse will be at least partly visible from most but not all places on Earth (sorry Australia and Japan). The moment of greatest eclipse is at 4:43 p.m. PT and the eclipse will then dissipate until it completes a little over two hours later, according to the U.S. Naval Observatory. Next up, Comet 45P/Honda-Mrkos-Pajdusakova has actually been visible with binoculars and telescopes for several weeks already, but it will be at its closest approach to Earth on the morning of February 11 as it passes by at a distance of 7.4 million miles (11.9 million kilometers) or 30 times further away than the moon.
Nerds, huh! (Score:2, Funny)
Those WEIRD NERDS, huh! They like to do things NOBODY IN THEIR RIGHT MIND would ever do, like look at stars! Crazy, am I right?
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Yes, every time I describe someone in not negative way, I use phrasings like "whose idea of a good time is..."
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Who's talking about looking at looking at stars?
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https://eclipse.gsfc.nasa.gov/... [nasa.gov]
This occurs completely in the USA. :)
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Well as long as the moon isn't subject to the entry ban. It suspiciously appears on a lot of islamic countries' flags. Something to hide methinks. Just sayin'.
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No, that's not good enough. We need to completely obliterate the Moon.
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Because it is nighttime in North America when the (western) Pacific Ocean is facing the sun.
A lunar eclipse at full moon... (Score:5, Informative)
... that is a given. The comet is a nice addition though.
Re:A lunar eclipse at full moon... (Score:5, Informative)
A lunar eclipse at full moon is a given ??? Are you crazy? No, its not!
I think you misunderstood GP, which admittedly was a bit poorly worded. I'm pretty sure GP meant that IF a lunar eclipse is happening, it IS a full moon. So two of the "triple features" mentioned in the summary are bound to be together anyway... all the nonsense about the "snow moon" notwithstanding. (What is the sudden obsession with old moon names in the past year or two? Very few people used these terms anymore outside of the Farmer's Almanac for years, and suddenly they're all over the news... and people keep acting like they're significant -- "Ooooh a 'SNOW moon'... ooooh a 'HARVEST moon'..." -- these happen every single year and mean nothing other than what month it is.)
The fact that the summary doesn't acknowledge that full moons are just normal at lunar eclipses makes it sound silly at best, ignorant of basic astronomy at worst. Terms like "rare convergence" make it even worse. And lunar eclipses aren't exactly "rare" events to begin with, although there are some unusual features of this penumbral one... but the fact that it's penumbral will actually make it less interesting to look at to the average observer.
Is it just me, or has there been an increase in hyperbolic astronomy stories recently? There was all the "supermoon" nonsense last year -- again, mildly interesting for astronomy nerds, but not so impressive for the average Joe who barely looks up at the sky. (The moon really wasn't THAT much bigger.) Now we're billing a "triple feature" for a lackluster lunar eclipse coupled with a full moon (which would be there anyway if an eclipse is happening), and a comet that you need binoculars to see.
I'm all for getting people to look at the sky and to get interested in astronomy, but if you overbill the significance of such things, I don't think it helps.
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... and suddenly they're all over the news...
Must be a snow news day.
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but if you overbill the significance of such things, I don't think it helps
Yes and no. A lot of people don't look at the sky often enough to realise that what they are seeing can be seen quite often. Just because the supermoon was overplayed and really not all that different from most other full moons doesn't mean that very many people didn't *think* it was amazing because they so rarely take the opportunity to actually go out and have a look at something in detail.
The "the morning of February 11"? Feb is 10th (Score:2)
Loks like a cut and paste error from here:
http://earthsky.org/astronomy-... [earthsky.org]
"Its closest point will come on February 11, 2017 at around 8 UTC, at which time the comet will be 0.08 AU (7.4 million miles, about 12 million km, or some 30 times the moon’s distance) from the Earth. Will you see it? Well are you an experienced observer or astrophotographer, used to finding faint objects in the sky? If not, probably not."
Timezone for those not in the US... So hyped! (Score:2)
PT is actually called PST and it means Pacific Standard Time (UTC -8), so "Friday 4:43 p.m. PT" can be translated to "Saturday 01:47CET" or "Saturday 00:47UTC".
Man, I hope this event is actually something worth seeing unlike other recent events. I'm so hyped!!!
Penumbral eclipse i.e. not noticeable, dim comet (Score:5, Informative)
Note that this is a penumbral eclipse, which basically means it is barely noticeable - the moon will very slightly reduce in brightness. For example, when we show full lunar eclipses in a time-lapse e.g. this nice one from 2015 [youtube.com], we start from the end of the penumbral phase, when the umbra actually touches the disk, since the penumbral part is not discernible.
As for the comet, it is past its "prime", as it is quickly moving away from the Sun. Unlike the rest of the celestial objects, for a comet the best time to observe them is when they are closest to the Sun, since that is when they are at their brightest and bear the longest "tail" - of course you also need a combination with some proximity to the earth, but for this comet the best time was a month ago when it was near the Sun at magnitude 6 (7 times brighter than currently). Yeah, once again /. is a bit late at reporting ;) If you still want to catch it though, do it fast, it is quickly fading.
Here in the UK... (Score:1)
A forecast of a comet, meteor shower or solar/lunar eclipse, is often just as good as a BBC weather forecast of unbroken cloud.
That snow moon .... (Score:3)