- A Blue Moon marks the second full moon in one calendar month.
- The next case will not occur until New Year’s Eve 2028.
- On Sunday, the Moon will be optically orange due to light scattering in the atmosphere.
- On the same day, there will be a micro full moon because the Moon will be extremely far away.
The so-called blue moon can be observed in the night sky on Sunday (May 31). It has nothing to do with his true color. This designation is used when two full moons occur in one calendar month. After this year’s May, the next time it will happen is on New Year’s Eve in 2028. Pavol Rapavý informed TASR about this on behalf of the Slovak Astronomers’ Association.
“There are 12 or 13 full moons in a year. The lunar phases repeat regularly every 29.5 days, astronomers call it a synodic month. However, calendar months, with the exception of February, have 30 or 31 days. So, exceptionally, two full moons can occur within one calendar month, if the first full moon is right at the beginning of the month and the next full moon at the end of it,” said Rapavý. As he explained, this year’s first May full moon occurred on May 1 and the next one will be on Sunday, so it is called a blue moon.
At the same time, he noted that The moon will be colored orange due to the Earth’s atmosphere, since the Earth’s atmosphere transmits the long-wave component of light best. As he explained, shorter wavelengths scatter more, which is why the sky is blue during the day. Exceptionally, however, according to him, the Moon can be colored blue in cases where there is a large amount of dust in the atmosphere, for example after extensive forest fires or volcanic eruptions, as was the case after the eruption of the Krakatoa volcano in 1883.
In addition, there will also be a micro full moon on Sunday. Rapavý explained that the Moon orbits the Earth in an elliptical orbit, its distance from us changes from 356,000 kilometers to 407,000 kilometers, and thus its apparent angular dimension in the sky also changes. As he added, the full moon will occur on Sunday at 10:45 a.m. SELČ and the farthest from us will be on June 1 at 06:34. SELF. According to him, a “blue micromoon” can be seen in the sky.
