From 8pm onwards tonight look up to the sky, and weather permitting you will see the first total Lunar eclipse visible from the UK since 2004 (but you’d not have seen that one, because it was cloudy).
Key times for the eclipse
- * Moon enters penumbra: 2018
* Moon enters umbra: 2130
* Totality begins: 2244
* Mid-eclipse: 2321
* Totality ends: 2358
* Moon leave umbra: 0111
* Moon leaves penumbra: 0224
The science bit
A lunar eclipse occurs when the Sun, Earth and Moon are lined up almost perfectly in space, with the Earth between the Sun and the Moon.
The Earth casts a cone-shaped shadow in space, and as the Moon passes though this shadow, the only light reaching it has passed though the Earth’s atmosphere. The quantity of dust and particulate pollution in the atmosphere affects the colour of the light that illuminates the Moon. Lots of dust leads to a deep red Moon, less dust produces a more orange colour.
I hope to get some photos of the event to post here
