Supermoon leaves sky gazers spellbound
There is something aweinspiring about this celestial body. We couldn’t see
the reddish tint of the Moon from
Year 7 student
Thousands of sky gazers across the UAE looked up to see an unusually large Moon on Sunday night and Monday morning — and the celestial body also seemed closer to Earth.
The first lunar eclipse of the year saw people look up to see a beautiful supermoon, though the view was muddied a bit by the cloudy night.
However, UAE enthusiasts were not as lucky as others across the world who got to witness a ‘blood moon’ (named due to the reddish tint from the sunlight filtering through the Earth’s atmosphere) on Sunday night and early Monday morning.
On the US East Coast, the spectacle began at 9:32pm on Sunday (May 15; 0132 GMT on May 16).
According to Space.com experts: “The eclipse was the longest total lunar eclipse in 33 years.”
Explaining the phenomenon, Hasan Al Hariri, CEO, Dubai Astronomy Group and Director Al Thuraya Astronomy Center, had earlier said: “This eclipse is a full one which turns the Moon into a reddish colour, and therefore is known as the ‘blood moon’. This is quite a phenomenon to observe. “This total lunar eclipse, with a ‘blood moon’ being visible once again, graced the sky after almost a year since the last total lunar eclipse,” he added.
Sunday’s full moon is also known as the Flower Moon named after the wildflowers blooming in the Northern Hemisphere. Explaining the spectacle, Al Hariri said: “The eclipse happens when the Moon goes into the shadow of the Earth. So, the Sun, Earth and Moon are in one line and the Moon gets eclipsed in this process. So, the light of the Moon becomes less, and it gets dark. But some of the scattered light that comes out from the atmosphere of the Earth reaches the Moon, and instead of making it totally black the Moon becomes reddish. That’s because the red light has more penetration properties than any other light. So, this makes the Moon [more] red in colour. There will be another eclipse on October 25 — a partial eclipse which will be visible from the UAE,” he added.
Some young space enthusiasts who stayed glued to their binoculars on Sunday waiting for the supermoon said it was quit an ethereal experience. Year 8 student Amatullah Arsiwala said: “The Moon looked beautiful. I am interested in astronomy, and I’ve read that as the Moon rotates around the Earth in an elliptical orbit, it sometimes goes further and sometimes comes close. This time it was close and therefore looked brighter and bigger. I feel there is something enigmatic about the Moon.”
Mohammed Matheranwala, a Year 7 student who is equally fascinated by the night sky and the Moon, says: “There is something awe-inspiring about this celestial body. We couldn’t see the reddish tint of the Moon from the UAE as the cosmic event was only visible from certain parts of the globe, but the big Full Moon, did look incredible.”
the UAE as the cosmic event was only visible from certain parts of the globe, but the big Full Moon, did look incredible.”
Mohammed Matheranwala