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Monday, June 13, 2011

Unusually Long Lunar Eclipse on Wednesday

Via MSNBC:
"This month's full moon will pass almost directly through the center of Earth's shadow on Wednesday in what will be an unusually long total eclipse of the moon.

[The] lunar eclipse will be taking place during the morning early hours of Thursday as they are west of the International Date Line.

The eclipse won't be visible from North America due to its timing, which places the event in the daylight hours when the moon is behind the local horizon.

At mid-eclipse (2013 GMT), the moon will be passing just to the north of the center of the Earth's shadow.

As such, the duration of totality is an unusually long 100 minutes, which is just seven minutes shy of the absolute maximum for a total lunar eclipse. In fact, over the last 100 years, only three other eclipses have rivaled the duration of totality of this eclipse : The total lunar eclipse of July 16, 1935, lasted 101 minutes; the eclipse of July 6, 1982, lasted 107 minutes; the eclipse of July 16, 2000, lasted 107 minutes.

The next total lunar eclipse of exceptional length will come on July 27, 2018, and will last 106 minutes.

UPDATE: Check out a photoblog of pictures of the lunar eclipse taken around the world.

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