Total Eclipse Of the moon February 21st 2008

[debs]

Hi all,

Its a crisp clear night here. Loking out my living room window I can see the moon is rising over the Bay of Fundy and reflecting beautifully. I have my binoculars at the ready. Scheduled time is in an hour and peaking at 10pm, but will look out bedroom window later to check it out.

Its nice to be out of town. No light pollution

TTFN

Debs

[Sno' problem]

Slightly hazy here, but should have a good view...will try and get some pics together, but i feel others may be in a better position.

[Sno' problem]

And it's gone a got cloudy/misty!!!!

[Blackie]

Morning all

A while since I have been on here. Too busy with work, and very late nights every day. Now that has eased off it's a struggle to stay away awake!

It was clear here until about 1am, although somewhat misty. But as soon as the eclipse started the clouds rolled in.

I did manage to get one or two shots of the moon with clouds before it completely disappeared. Here they are from about half an hour ago, although nothing to get excited about I'm afraid. If I can find one or two from last year I will post those as a comparison.

[PersianPaladin]

Watch it live here: -

http://www.ustream.tv/channel/2008-lunar-eclipse

[Sno' problem]

Skies are just beginning to clear here!

Just in time for a decent view i hope??

Morning all

A while since I have been on here. Too busy with work, and very late nights every day. Now that has eased off it's a struggle to stay away awake!

It was clear here until about 1am, although somewhat misty. But as soon as the eclipse started the clouds rolled in.

I did manage to get one or two shots of the moon with clouds before it completely disappeared. Here they are from about half an hour ago, although nothing to get excited about I'm afraid. If I can find one or two from last year I will post those as a comparison.

Nice Pics Blackie!

[Roger J Smith]

Just got back in from a stunning view of the total phase, with skies 80% clear and such cloud as was about to the south rather than east. Moon well up above horizon (7:30 pm PST) with bright Saturn to left and almost as bright Regulus above.

Moon's disk was generally dull salmon-pink in colour but trending to brighter gold in southern hemisphere, this probably due to earthshine effect with more light reflected from Antarctica at this time of year (from daylit side of earth, light refracts around through our atmosphere, although not shining directly on the Moon).

Generally speaking the Moon was darkened but by no means without ambient luminosity, it looked like an old red tennis ball that had been sitting in some water for a few months. Through binoculars it was quite sublime in appearance with the craters in the deep twilight just barely discernible except for those closer to the southern limb (which appeared more to the right than the lower part of the orb due to the perspective of the orbit at this time of year).

We got some rather dodgy pictures on a digital camera, main problem was the long exposure required, these will probably need some editing before being even marginally suitable for viewing, but it was a very nice eclipse, certainly one of the brighter eclipsed Moon sightings I can recall.

Now the excitement shifts to possible man-made meteor shower, if the U.S. military blows up the wayward satellite, the fragments are supposed to shower down on our part of the world later tonight. Going to try to find the details for that possible event now. Anyone heard anything?

[Blackie]

Just got back in from a stunning view of the total phase, with skies 80% clear and such cloud as was about to the south rather than east. Moon well up above horizon (7:30 pm PST) with bright Saturn to left and almost as bright Regulus above.

Moon's disk was generally dull salmon-pink in colour but trending to brighter gold in southern hemisphere, this probably due to earthshine effect with more light reflected from Antarctica at this time of year (from daylit side of earth, light refracts around through our atmosphere, although not shining directly on the Moon).

Generally speaking the Moon was darkened but by no means without ambient luminosity, it looked like an old red tennis ball that had been sitting in some water for a few months. Through binoculars it was quite sublime in appearance with the craters in the deep twilight just barely discernible except for those closer to the southern limb (which appeared more to the right than the lower part of the orb due to the perspective of the orbit at this time of year).

We got some rather dodgy pictures on a digital camera, main problem was the long exposure required, these will probably need some editing before being even marginally suitable for viewing, but it was a very nice eclipse, certainly one of the brighter eclipsed Moon sightings I can recall.

Now the excitement shifts to possible man-made meteor shower, if the U.S. military blows up the wayward satellite, the fragments are supposed to shower down on our part of the world later tonight. Going to try to find the details for that possible event now. Anyone heard anything?

Glad to hear you got a good view, Roger. Would love to see those pics, if you can post them later.

Such a disappointment it clouded over here for the actual event. I was really hoping to capture the eclipse so I could compare it with last year's one I photographed. I stayed up until 3.45am but you could only barely make out a bright patch even in the odd cloud break. So I gave up and went to bed. Oh well, roll on 2015 or whenever the next one is!

If you do post some that you took I will see if I can find one or two from last year to compare how the moon appeared both times.

Cheers

Peter

[Cookie]

great pics blackie!

[*Stormforce~beka*]

And it's gone a got cloudy/misty!!!!

Yup same here! I went to bed at 2am and it was ok. Got up at 230 and 3am and it was all cloudy so gave up and went back to bed.

Yup those piccies are good!

Edited February 21, 2008 by *Stormforce~beka*

[Roger J Smith]

Well, like I said the photos we got were pretty poor but I am posting this one (slightly edited) because it does show the coloration fairly well, if you squint at this picture it will probably look a bit more like what was seen too. The time stamp on this one was 0335z so well within totality, yet the south polar region (bottom right) appears almost golden due to refracted sunlight, I presume, getting around the earth and reaching that part of the Moon.