Partial Lunar Eclipse of September 17, 2024

Partial lunar eclipse on September 17, 2024

Did you go out and look at the lunar eclipse on Tuesday night? What did you think of it? Not as good as the Blood Moons we've seen in recent years. But it's always fun to watch the moon pass through earth's shadow, even if it's not fully immersed. Did you notice that it was a supermoon? Neither did I. The media sure loves to push supermoons on us, but the small difference in the moon's size between its average distance and closest distance from us is difficult to judge with the naked eye. And regardless of its size, the moon always looks super when it's on the rise.

What optical gear did you use? A lunar eclipse can be seen and appreciated without any optical aid, but a pair of (at least) 7x binoculars will improve the view. A small telescope is even better. Not everyone has a pair of binoculars or a small telescope hanging around in the house, which is too bad. Did you take any pictures? Lunar eclipses are certainly "to each, his own" type of events. Some people don't want to be bothered with complicated equipment like smart telescopes and cameras. They'd rather enjoy the view with their eyeballs. Ever since the very first lunar eclipse I watched in July of 1982, I've never been satisfied to watch an eclipse without taking pictures of it. My visual memory isn't very good. If all I did was sit out there and watch the eclipse, I'd probably forget what it looked like after a few months. So I didn't mind hauling out the 11-inch scope the other night and getting it set up for the lunar eclipse. For the picture above, I used a DSLR and HyperStar on the scope at f/2, which gives a wide field of view and fast exposures at low (less noise) ISO's.

Who did you watch the eclipse with? This is where the rubber meets the road for dedicated skywatchers, in my opinion. Over the years, I've found that it's difficult to find any family members or friends interested enough in the night sky to take time out and watch a lunar eclipse with me. I don't want to miss a lunar eclipse. I have to be out there at the appointed time. I mark my calendar. I make the time. But people who aren't dedicated skywatchers typically don't care much about lunar eclipses. After all, lunar eclipses happen at night, when people are tired after a long day at work, and it's dark and possibly cold. If not cold, it's buggy and annoying to be outside at night, what with critters making strange noises in the distant blackness, and neighbors wondering what in the world you're doing out there. One night long ago, I was out in my back yard with my telescope and the neighbors called the cops! And let's face it: a lunar eclipse is quite boring to those who don't really care about them. Most people are happy enough to walk outside for a minute to look up and see it, then go back inside. I think you have to be a dedicated skywatcher to sit or stand out there the entire time to watch it from beginning to end. If that's the kind of person you are, then you are probably more likely to be committed enough to own a telescope and spend many evenings with it out in your back yard. The real tell, however, is when you do it again for the next lunar eclipse! Most people say, "Nope. Been there, done that. Don't need to see another one."

I was glad to have my daughter with me to view this lunar eclipse. She didn't mind putting up with the dive-bombing bats and pesky mosquitoes. As if those things weren't annoying enough, we had a lot of clouds to deal with. My daughter took some eclipse pictures by merely holding her iPhone up to the eyepiece of our small refractor. Her pictures turned out better than the ones that I took with the big scope and DSLR! Looking through the eyepiece of the refractor was interesting. The clouds passing through gave the illusion that the moon was transparent, and that the clouds were passing behind it. When the clouds were thin, you could tell there was an eclipse. But when the clouds got thick, you couldn't tell whether there was an eclipse or if the clouds were simply blocking the moon. In this case, photography was the better way to experience it. You could grab a shot when the clouds cleared, to hang onto the memory. I think if I had just been watching it without any equipment, I'd remember the clouds more than the few glimpses of the eclipsed moon we were able to get.

As usual, I'm left to puzzle over the news media who love to blast the general public with reports of an upcoming lunar eclipse, especially the partial (less interesting) lunar eclipses. I can't cite any big data to support my take on this, but I suspect that the vast majority of people either don't bother to read those articles or, if they do, they don't follow up on them and go out to watch. Only the dedicated skywatchers will care enough to see it, and these people have other sources to alert them to celestial events long before they reach the attention of the general news media. They don't need to be hounded by the online news headlines for weeks prior to an eclipse. And yet, I also have to believe that the news media wouldn't put out so many articles like this if they didn't get enough hits on them in previous years. Seems like they must have the data that tells them a lunar eclipse article is enough of a money-maker to trouble themselves over. Of course, they really have to hype them up. The headlines will use teasers like you'll get to see a "rare event" or that it's not just an eclipse, but there's also going to be a "supermoon." They even go to the extreme of bringing up the folklore name of the full moon, "See this month's Harvest Moon!" as if that makes it more special or meaningful. At a glance, you won't notice the difference between September's "Harvest Moon" and August's "Sturgeon Moon." And unless you take pictures of a supermoon and a normal moon and zoom them up to count the pixels making up the moon's image in each one, you're probably not going to notice the size difference between them, either. As for being rare, the average person with no knowledge of solar-system mechanics will have no appreciation for what makes them rare. If it's rare because it coincides with a solstice or equinox, it changes relatively nothing about the appearance of the eclipse to the casual viewer. And even though a particular eclipse might have something rare about it, you will more than likely get to see another eclipse within a few years or less. It's not like this is your last chance to see a lunar eclipse. I don't recall if it was hyped for being rare, but I did appreciate the total lunar eclipse that happened to occur on the winter solstice of 2010. That's because the sun is at its lowest point in the sky at winter solstice, and that means the moon, being opposite the sun during eclipse, is at its highest point in the nighttime sky. Being so high in the sky, looking at it through the thinnest possible amount of earth atmosphere made for easy, sharply focused picture taking.

If you didn't read about it in the recent lunar eclipse news articles, the next one for us in the US will be on the night of the 13th and 14th of March, 2025. I've already marked my calendar. It'll be much better because it's going to be a total lunar eclipse, or Blood Moon, as the media loves to call them. I'm sure the future articles will make a point of telling you that the full moon in March is called the "Worm Moon." But—spoiler alert—it's not going to be a supermoon! Hate to disappoint. Even worse, it's going to be an apogee (furthest distance from earth) moon, which is 5% smaller than a normal moon. Oh, boy! Now you're not even going to want to watch it! As if that isn't disappointing enough, it doesn't reach its maximum blood phase until nearly midnight (for those of us in the west). Who's gonna want to stand out in their back yard at midnight, just to look at the moon in the earth's shadow? Gotta get up early in the morning to go to work. Bah! Humbug!

But I'll be out there taking pictures. If the Good Lord is willing and the creek don't rise.

Most of the time, Tuesday night's eclipse looked like this. The photo at top was taken between clouds.

Update, April 20, 2025:

We had some rain on March 13 and 14, and I didn't take any pictures of the lunar eclipse. However, during maximum eclipse, there were a few breaks in the clouds, and I got to see the "Blood Moon." It was very beautiful. If it weren't for the threat of rain, I would have made an attempt to take some pictures. But for the first time in many years, I watched a lunar eclipse without using a telescope, and without a camera. I did use a pair of 8 x 42 binoculars to see it better. The only thing I can remember about it now is that on that night, because of the rain, I hadn't even paid attention to what time it was supposed to reach maximum eclipse. At some point in the evening, I went outside to check the sky, and when I opened the back door, I could see some stars against a very dark sky. My first thought was, "Why is the sky so dark? Shouldn't the moon be making it bright?" And then I looked up and saw a very dim, reddish-colored moon. What a surprise!