People are starting to see lurid headlines about the “Super Blood Wolf Moon lunar eclipse” happening this weekend. Specifically, on Sunday night, the Moon will be eclipsed. The phenomenon will be visible throughout North, Central, and South America. It’s entirely normal and nothing to disturb your chakras with or invoke ancient chants during while using crystal suppositories and waving burning herbs in the air. On the upside, there’s no blood involved, but the Moon will appear reddish during totality.

This event is a completely understandable and cool-to-watch phenomenon. It happens as a result of the Moon and Earth circling the Sun in their orbits. The whole eclipse takes a little over five hours from start to finish. If you want to know more about how they work, check out this fabulous page at NASA/JPL. It gives you a step-by-step “narrative” about how the eclipse will proceed.

A lunar eclipse occurs when the orbit of the Earth and Moon line up well enough that the Moon passes behind Earth and through its shadow.

Where and When to Look at the Lunar Eclipse

For people throughout the Western hemisphere, there’s a good chance to see the entire eclipse, or at least part of it starting around 9:36 p.m. Eastern time (in the U.S.). It’ll show up in the western part of the sky. Of course, it all depends on the weather. There are some storms on the horizon for the weekend for parts of the country. For more details on your location and chances of seeing it, check out Time and Date. They have maps and charts available.

Want to watch it live? Check out Griffith Observatory’s live feed Sunday night for a comfortable viewing experience.

Why “Super Blood Wolf” Moon?

Humans LOVE to nickname things. For some, it’s not enough simply to call this event a lunar eclipse. It also comes with some cultural baggage. First, the word “blood” gets used to describe the reddish color the Moon will take on. That’s due to atmospheric conditions that filter out blue light coming from the Sun. The resulting “bath” of reddish photons makes the Moon look red. It’s not really red, though. Plus, astronomers don’t use the term “blood” unless they happen to cut themselves making a sandwich or something.

Second, the term “Wolf Moon” comes from a usage first adopted a few hundred years ago in the U.S. The Natives who inhabited hereand the colonists who came later called it the “Full Wolf Moon”. That’s for the first full Moon in January. They associated it with hungry wolves howling around during the cold winter months. It’s similar in spirit to “Harvest Moon” and other “full moon” names people use throughout the year.

The full Moon we’ll be seeing on Sunday night IS also known as a “supermoon.” That’s because the Moon is slightly closer to Earth in its orbit than usual. That happens and is completely normal and nothing to worry about; the best thing we can do is dress warmly, go outside, and check it out!