We had a full moon overnight and this one was unique. It was a super moon (bigger and brighter) and a blue moon. The type of blue moon is not what you generally think of and I have a description below as to why it's unique.
But can we see the pictures?!
SUPER MOON
The moon orbits the Earth but not in a perfect circle. There are times when the moon is farther away in the elliptical orbit called apogee. At that point, it's 253,000 miles away. But on the opposite end of the orbit when it's closest to Earth, called perigee, the moon is around 226,000 miles away.
It looked up to 14% larger and 30% brighter!
BLUE MOON
We normally hear about a blue moon when we have two full moons in a calendar month. In 2024, we actually don't have an occurrence of this. So how is tonight's full moon a blue moon?
It's a seasonal blue moon.
Yes, there are two definitions for a blue moon. The more common occurrence is what I talked about above. But a full moon can also be called "blue" when it's the fourth in a given season. The August full moon is our fourth of the summer season. Thus, it's a blue moon too.
Summer isn't over. It actually doesn't end until Sept. 22.
We'll have another full moon before then on Sept. 19. The third full moon of four is the one called "blue," thus Monday night's event!
The next time we get a seasonal blue moon isn't until May 2027. And that's not also at the same time of a super moon. That won't happen again until 2037.
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