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Morning News

NASA Astronomer Hopes First Lunar Eclipse in Two Years is 'Blood Red'

Aired January 20, 2000 - 9:37 a.m. ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

BILL HEMMER, CNN ANCHOR: Keep your fingers crossed: For most parts of the country, if the weather cooperates, sky watchers in for a bit of a treat tonight. The first lunar eclipse in two years will literally turn the moon red.

From the Goddard Space Station in Maryland, here's NASA astronomer Philip Plait to bring us up to date on this.

Good morning to you.

PHILIP PLAIT, NASA ASTRONOMER: Good morning.

HEMMER: So you need two things: clear skies and two eyes. Is that what you need for tonight's show?

PLAIT: Pretty much, that's all you need. You just need to go outside and watch this. What's going to happen is the moon is going to pass into the Earth's shadow that's being cast by the sun out into space. As the moon orbits the Earth, sometimes it goes right into the Earth's shadow, as you can see in this animation. And when it's deep in the shadow, the moon sometimes -- and we're hoping that this will happen tonight -- it'll turn very red -- sort of a blood red. That's because molecules and pollutants in the Earth's atmosphere, they scatter away the blue light from the sun letting only the red light comes through, and it's that red light that hits the moon, and that's what we see. Hopefully, it'll look something like this, as you can see here.

HEMMER: More on that in a second, about the shade of the moon, but what about best viewing times for folks who are interested? When can they get the best opportunity?

PLAIT: In Eastern time, the show really starts at 10:05. That's when the moon enters the darkest part of the Earth's shadow. It'll stay in the dark part for about 78 minutes. The thing will be over by about 1:30 when the last part of the moon leaves the last part of the shadow.

HEMMER: Now, you were talking about the moon turning this reddish color. I understand that's not a guarantee. It kind of depends on conditions. Why is that, Philip?

PLAIT: That's correct. For example, in 1991 when Mount Penatubo erupted, that puts a lot of dust and junk in the Earth's atmosphere, and that really does rob the blue light from the sun, and so you get a very red moon. But there hasn't been a volcanic eruption in quite some time, so it's hard to predict exactly how red the moon's going to look tonight.

HEMMER: As an astronomer, and for other scientists, what can they learn, if anything, from this?

PLAIT: There's not a whole lot more we can learn from lunar eclipses anymore, although we learn more about the Earth's atmosphere and the pollutants that are in it by judging how red the moon is. But a long time ago, there were different things we learned. For example, the ancient Greeks realized that the Earth was a sphere because the shadow cast on the moon by the Earth was always a circle, and you can only have that if it's a sphere.

HEMMER: We'll watch it tonight here in North America. And, I guess, if you're in Asia in July, you can catch it again, is that right?

PLAIT: That's correct; or on the West Coast or Hawaii.

HEMMER: All right, good deal.

Philip Plait, NASA astronomer, we'll keep our eyes on the sky tonight. Thanks for talking with us.

PLAIT: Thank you.

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