The Novice Writer: Blue Moon Explained!!

BLUE MOON EXPLAINED!

INTRODUCTION:

A blue moon is an additional full moon that appears in a subdivision of a year: either the third or fourth full moon in a season or the second full moon in a calendar month.

The phrase has nothing to do with the actual color of the moon, although a literal "blue moon" (the moon appearing with a tinge of blue) may occur in certain atmospheric conditions: e.g., if volcanic eruptions or fires leave particles in the atmosphere of just the right size to preferentially scatter red light.

THE COLLOQUIAL USE:

The March 1946 issue of Sky & Telescope misinterpreted the traditional definition, which led to the modern colloquial misunderstanding that a blue moon is a second full moon in a single solar calendar month with no seasonal link.

Owing to the rarity of a blue moon, the term "blue moon" is used colloquially to mean a rare event, as in the phrase "once in a blue moon".

THE VIDEO:

Source: NASA... UNILND TECH

One lunation (an average lunar cycle) is 29.53 days. There are about 365.24 days in a tropical year. Therefore, about 12.37 lunations (365.24 days divided by 29.53 days) occur in a tropical year. In the widely used Gregorian calendar, there are 12 months (the word month is derived from the moon) in a year, and normally there is one full moon each month. Each calendar year contains roughly 11 days more than the number of days in 12 lunar cycles. The extra days accumulate, so every two or three years (seven times in the 19-year Metonic cycle), there is an extra full moon. The extra full moon necessarily falls in one of the four seasons, giving that season four full moons instead of the usual three, and, hence, a blue moon.

THE LEAP YEAR ARTICLE HERE: (http://basicconceptuality.blogspot.in/2018/03/the-leap-year-explained.html)

THE LITERAL MEANING:

The most literal meaning of blue moon is when the moon (not necessarily a full moon) appears to a casual observer to be unusually bluish, which is a rare event. The effect can be caused by smoke or dust particles in the atmosphere, as has happened after forest fires in Sweden and Canada in 1950 and 1951, and after the eruption of Krakatoa in 1883, which caused the moon to appear blue for nearly two years.

The key to a blue moon is having lots of particles slightly wider than the wavelength of red light (0.7 micrometers)—and no other sizes present. It is rare, but volcanoes sometimes produce such clouds, as do forest fires. Ash and dust clouds have thrown into the atmosphere by fires and storms usually contain a mixture of particles with a wide range of sizes, with most smaller than 1 micrometer, and they tend to scatter blue light. This kind of cloud makes the moon turn red; thus red moons are far more common than blue moons.

Two full moons in one month (the second of which is a "blue moon"):

2009: December 2 and 31 (partial lunar eclipse visible in some parts of the world), only in time zones west of UTC+05.
2010: January 1 (partial lunar eclipse) and 30, only in time zones east of UTC+04:30.
2010: March 1 and 30, only in time zones east of UTC+07.
2012: August 2 and 31, only in time zones west of UTC+10.
2012: September 1 and 30, only in time zones east of UTC+10:30.
2015: July 2 and 31.
2018: January 2 and 31, only in time zones west of UTC+11.
2018: March 2 and 31, only in time zones west of UTC+12.
2020: October 1 and 31, only in time zones west of UTC+10.

SUPER BLUE BLOOD MOON ECLIPSE:

Total lunar eclipses are also sometimes called Blood Moons because of the reddish-orange glow the Moon takes on during the eclipse.

In some parts of the world, the eclipsed Full Moon will be a Blue Moon. It is also almost a Supermoon, prompting many to call this eclipse a Super Blue Blood Moon eclipse.

An Eclipse Never Comes Alone!

A solar eclipse always occurs about two weeks before or after a lunar eclipse.

Usually, there are two eclipses in a row, but other times, there are three during the same eclipse season.

All eclipses 1900 — 2199

This is the first eclipse this season.

Second eclipse this season: 15 February 2018 — Partial Solar Eclipse

So, now that we have figured out that the "RED or the BLUE MOON" is nothing but just a Lunar Eclipse. As bright as we see the moon in the night sky, what we are really seeing is the "sunlight" and the percentage of the luminosity depends on where the moon is with respect to the phase of the earth. We observe a no moon when the moon is closest to the sun and a full moon when it is farthest to it.

But now you might think if it is so, then we should see the eclipse on every full moon but that's not the case.

As the orbit of the moon is tilted by a few degrees relative to the orbit of the earth.

Hence, in the most full moons, the earth is not directly in the way of the moon and the sun.

But, every once in a while it so happens that all the three are in exact same line.

Lunar eclipses are pretty common as far the astronomical phenomenon go. On an average, there is every 1.5 lunar eclipse per solar year. But it should be 0 to 2 lunar eclipse as there is no such thing as a half eclipse.

Not all the eclipse are the same. If the orbit of the moon is closer to the earth when they line up then it is called a Super Moon - that is the lunar surface looks 14% larger and 30% brighter from the surface of the earth. It might be sounding big but in reality, it is a small change that our eyes won't even notice it if we did not even know it was happening.

The opposite of this phenomenon when the moon is farthermost to the earth when it lines up then we call it Apogee - Syzygy.

On 25th Septemeber, 2015 a very rare thing happened, most of us on earth experienced a super blood moon; that might only happen next in 2033 according to the astronomers.

Because the sun is so much bigger to the earth we cast a two-part shadow on the moon - the lighter region or the wider outer shadow known as the "penumbra" and the darker region known as the "umbra". The moon barely dims as it enters the penumbra. No sooner the moon starts entering the umbra region the temperature on the surface of the moon falls from 100-degree Celcius in the sun to minus 150-degrees Celcius in the umbra region.

But as soon as the moon aligns itself with the earth and is completely inside the umbra we see the red moon or the super blood moon.

We can understand this better if look from the perspective of the moon. Lunar eclipse from the earth is same as the Solar eclipse from the moon.

When the moon is completely inside the earth's umbra a tiny bit of the sun's light bends through the earth's atmosphere and comes out the other side of a ring-shaped lens. In this journey to the moon, the sun's light is filtered out from the earth's atmosphere of the shorter wavelengths of light resulting in the red color. It is the same reason as to why we see sun-rise and sunset red on earth. Hence, you can sum it up as if you are watching every sunset and sunrise that ever happened on earth at the same time. And that my friend is an experience that is worth waiting for.