News Details (Posted: October 27, 2004):

Total Eclipse!

Full Description:

October 27th, 2004 will bring a TOTAL lunar eclipse. It will be best visible in Western Europe and North America. Below is a timeline, for Eastern Daylight Time. • 9:14 p.m.: Moon enters Earth’s dark umbral shadow • 10:23 p.m.: Totality begins • 11:04 p.m.: Mid-eclipse • 11:45 p.m.: Totality ends • 12:54 a.m. (Oct. 28): Moon leaves the umbra Interestingly, this will be fourth total lunar eclipse dating back to May 15, 2003. Four successive lunar eclipses can all be total ones, each eclipse coming at intervals of just under six months apart. Such an unusual lunar cycle is called a tetrad. The Italian astronomer Giovanni Schiaparelli (1835-1910) discovered that during a period of about three centuries tetrads can occur rather frequently; then in the next three hundred years tetrads never occur at all. After this month's eclipse, there will be no other total lunar eclipses until March 3, 2007.