CAPE CANAVERAL, Florida — Now it’s the moon’s turn to put on a disappearing act. After being left out of this month’s total solar eclipse, the Americas will have the best seats in the celestial house when Earth’s shadow briefly envelops the moon. Almost the entire lunar surface will be masked from Thursday night through Friday (a whopping 96%), making it an especially deep partial eclipse. The moon is already in the spotlight. NASA sent Artemis II astronauts on an unprecedented lunar flyby in April, the prelude to eventually landing on the surface and building a base filled with people and robots for years to come. “This is a great time to be a part of the space program, right? We’re not going to slow down,” NASA astronaut Jack Hathaway told The Associated Press from the International Space Station last week. It’s the second act of the biggest spectacle in the solar system, which comes two weeks after a total solar eclipse paraded. Greenland, Iceland and Spain. Eclipses always travel in pairs when the Sun, Moon and Earth align so precisely that one obscures the other. This is because the Moon is 400 times smaller than the Sun, which is 400 times further away, making them appear the same size – a cosmic coincidence and a gift from the universe. The next lunar eclipse, which will unfold at a slower pace, will have a much larger audience than Europe’s solar spectacle. The eclipsed moon will be visible to billions of people in North and South America, Europe, Africa and the Middle East, as long as the skies are clear. The lunar eclipse may also be visible to Hathaway and the nine other people living off the planet: seven astronauts on the International Space Station and three aboard China’s orbital outpost. Space provides a “unique perspective” for viewing cosmic wonders such as eclipses and auroras, said space station commander Jessica Meir. In this case, the Earth will pass between the moon and the sun, casting a reddish-orange shadow over our closest neighbor. Because this is a partial eclipse, the alignment will not be perfect and it will not be a true blood moon. The partial phase of the eclipse will last more than three hours. But the entire eclipse, from the moment the full moon enters the faintest, outer edge of Earth’s shadow until it recedes, will last five and a half hours. The eclipse will peak just after midnight EDT. Nearly one billion people in the U.S., Canada, and Central and South America will have front-row views of the entire eclipse. More than 3 billion people (44% of the world’s population) will be able to capture at least some of it. The eclipsed moon will set over Europe, Africa and the Middle East, shortening the show. It will be rising over Hawaii, making the eastern Pacific a late start along with the northwestern sections of the US and Canada. This is the second lunar eclipse of the year and the fourth eclipse overall. A total lunar eclipse graced the skies over America, Australia and eastern Asia in March. The next full lunar blackout won’t be until New Year’s Eve 2028, with Asia and Australia taking center stage. And it will be until 2029 before stargazers in North and South America enjoy another full lunar eclipse.
