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When sunlight hits Earth’s atmosphere at a certain angle, scattering (due to air molecules and dust particles) causes the creation of longer wavelengths of light: i.e. Interestingly, the blood red color comes from a similar effect: During a total lunar eclipse, the only light hitting the Moon is sunlight that has been refracted through the Earth’s atmosphere. This rare event is called a selenelion or the slightly less romantic horizontal eclipse.
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As luck would have it, the Earth’s atmosphere bends (refracts) the light from the Sun and Moon so that they appear slightly higher on the horizon than they actually are. As we’ve covered previously, a lunar eclipse is caused by the Earth getting in between the Sun and Moon - and so it should technically be impossible for you to see the Sun and a lunar eclipse at the same time. Lunar eclipse of October 8, visibility chartĬuriously, though, moonset on the east coast will occur at 7:01am - the exact same time as sunrise.
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