Upcoming Total Lunar Eclipse on August 28th, 2007

By the end of August, you might be just cooling down from the excitement of the Perseid meteor show, but it’s time to gather the friends and family again for another fantastic sky show – a total lunar eclipse on Tuesday, August 28th, 2007. This is going to be one of most popular, visible from 5 continents, including most of North America. Got that, set your calendar right now.

If you live in Western North America like me, you know we’ve gotten the short end of the lunar eclipse stick for the past few years. Well, now’s our time to shine in the ruddy glow of a fully eclipsed moon. This is the one we’ve been waiting for.

The eclipse will begin just after midnight August 28th for folks in Pacific Daylight Time – 12:54 am PDT. It won’t look like much in the beginning, but then the Earth’s shadow will slowly start to darken the Moon. Around 2 hours later, at 2:52 am PDT, the eclipse will reach totality, when the Moon is fully in the Earth’s shadow. It will change from grey to red, and stay that way for another 90 minutes. Then it will exit the shadow again just before dawn.

The eclipse will be visible from Australia, Japan, parts of Asia and most of the Americas. Unfortunately, it won’t be visible to observers in Africa or Europe. Since the eclipse gets a late start, we’ll get a good view on the West Coast of North America; as long as you’re willing to stay up late. Eastern observers will need to bring coffee, since their view won’t wrap up until 7:22 am EDT.

Here’s a special web page from NASA on the eclipse, providing diagrams and starting times for this event. I’ll provide another reminder as we get closer to the 28th, I just wanted to make you aware, and encourage you to set that evening aside for a wonderful sky show.

Original Source:NASA Eclipse Information