Fans of eclipses rejoice; we have a partial lunar eclipse viewing coming to northwest Florida. It will be a long one too, the longest in nearly 600 years.
You can view it Thursday night, starting just after midnight into early Friday morning. The peak will be around 3 in the morning on Friday, so make some coffee.
Here’s a timeline of events Thursday night – Friday morning:
You’ll want to look up and into the western sky around peak (3 AM CST).
Clouds should begin to move out of the area behind a cold front Thursday evening. The viewing conditions will be great, just have a jacket nearby.
It’s the second lunar eclipse for 2021, but this one will be the longest of the century. The peak will last over 3 hours, the entire event just over 6 hours. The Earth’s shadow, or “umbra” shadow, will cover over 90% of the moon’s diameter at peak.
Our area will get a good viewing of the eclipse, nearly 99% of the moon could fall under the “umbra” shadow. We’ll be able to see this well from northwest Florida according to NASA.
At peak, the moon will appear to turn red and should be fully visible to the naked eye. It’s also worth noting that this will not be a total eclipse, it’s very close. A small portion of the moon will remain outside of Earth’s umbra, or shadow region. A small sliver of the moon will still appear white within a partially shadowed region called the penumbra.
In a lunar eclipse, the Earth passes between the sun and the moon. The Earth’s shadow covers the moon in this scenario, something we can view from the surface. Most of the moon will be within the umbra (shadow), this is thanks to the moon and Earth’s position Thursday night.
SEND YOUR PHOTOS TO CHIME IN ON OUR WEBSITE:
We’ll have our own photos, but we would love to see your photos too. Send them in to this Chime In link on Thursday night and Friday morning. We’ll feature them on air over the next several days.
