We Didn’t
Everybody was all atwitter over the Supermoon this past weekend. I saw lots of really hyper news stories about this amazing event, and a few really strange posts linking the SuperMoon to all kinds of supernatural things. SuperMoon really isn’t a term that astronomers use. It was coined by an astrologer, and doesn’t really have any scientific meaning. But, it catches people’s attention and gets them to look at the Moon, which isn’t a bad thing.
Anyway, I assume a lot of people went out, looked at the Full Moon above the horizon (where the Moon usually appears largest) and thought to themselves, “Wow, that is super.” If that’s what YOU did, that’s great. The Moon did appear slightly larger (although I doubt the average viewer would have noticed exactly HOW much larger), and I hear it was very pretty.
I say that because we got clouded out last night, and I only got a tiny peek at the Moon very late in the evening, high above the mountain behind us. Not that I could have told you, “Oh that Moon looks a few percent bigger than last month”. I do watch the Moon and stars and planets, to be sure. We did hope to see an International Space Station pass last night, too, but the clouds precluded that. Sometimes the clouds get you, and there’s nothing you can do but stay inside and do something else indulgently astronomical. I worked on writing some skygazing material for next month, and did a little research for a script I’m doing about the Moon.
So, I hope if you SuperMooned, it was a great sight. I hope that it piqued your interest about continuing to observe the Moon. It’s pretty easy to do: you just keep following the Moon’s progress through the sky over the next two weeks. It’ll slowly change shape to a narrow crescent, appearing in the early morning hours. Then, it’ll be New Moon, and shortly thereafter, the first crescent of the next cycle will appear low in the western sky after sunset. This happens month after month, and the beauty of the scene is always breathtakingly lovely. It’ll hook you on Moon-gazing and the next thing you know, you’ll be memorizing craters and maria on the Moon and taking images of it.
Enjoy!
We were lucky here, one clear evening (clouds, clouds, clouds), so I could see the full “super” Moon.
I recently acquired a used 76mm aperture Newton telescope (my first telescope!), you can’t go much smaller than that.
And boy, the Moon was bright in that telescope, it almost hurt! I had use the cap (that allows one to stop down the aperture) to make the brightness bearable. Starting out with the Moon is nice, so much detail to see. And much easier than other things in the sky.
Yes, I always point out to people how easy the Moon is to observe. However, if you DO deep-sky observing, it does blow your dark adaptation! 😉
Yeah, it’s like looking into a car’s headlights. 🙂 I didn’t plan to do any deep-sky observing anyway, only a short Moon session. I have to keep the sessions short, as siting for longer time outside is not good for me, and my whole body starts to ache. So it’s OK.
The next session will be Saturn, with its (his?) rings. Maybe I should get a eye patch to use it way before I start a observation session – as I read it on Steve Waldee’s website. Then my eye will be adapted when I start the session and can avoid have to spent too much time in the cold and instead focus on my observation target for the night.