We have witnessed the annual Solar Eclipse on December 26th 2019, tomorrow on January 10th there is the first penumbral lunar eclipse (called Chandra Grahan in Hindi) of 2020 and this will be visible in India. NASA has coined the term “Wolf Moon Eclipse” for this celestial event. The 4 hours and 5 minutes long lunar eclipse will be visible in countries across Asia, Africa, and Europe
Eclipses are the natural celestial events in cosmos, it naturally occurs in every star system including our solar system. There are mainly two types of eclipse called Solar Eclipse and Lunar Eclipse.
What is the Solar Eclipse?
A solar eclipse occurs when the Moon passes between Earth and the Sun, thereby totally or partly obscuring the Sun for a viewer on Earth. This occurs when the Sun, Moon and Earth are aligned and when a portion of the Earth is engulfed in a shadow cast by the Moon. In a total eclipse, the disk of the Sun is fully obscured by the Moon. In partial and annular eclipses, only part of the Sun is obscured.
What is the Lunar Eclipse?
A lunar eclipse occurs when the Moon passes directly behind Earth and into its shadow. This can occur only when the Sun, Earth, and Moon are very closely aligned in a specific manner, with Earth between the other two. A lunar eclipse can occur only on the night of a full moon. There are three types of lunar eclipse known as the total, penumbral, partial lunar eclipse.
A total lunar eclipse occurs when Earth completely blocks direct sunlight from reaching the Moon. The partial lunar eclipse occurs when the Earth moves between the Sun and Moon but the three celestial bodies do not form a straight line in space, and a total penumbral lunar eclipse occurs when the Moon becomes completely immersed in the penumbral cone of the Earth without touching the umbra.
Umbra and Penumbra are the shadows formed by the earth during an eclipse; the region of the complete shadow is called the umbra and the region of the diffuse shadow is called the penumbra.
You can expect to see the moon in comparatively larger in size during the penumbral lunar eclipse. The Moon will also appear dim, and won’t be as bright as on other days. This year there will be three more penumbral lunar eclipses on June 5, July 5, and November 30. The first penumbral lunar eclipses happening tomorrow for 4 hours and 5 minutes and it will be visible from 10:37 PM IST on January 10 to 2:42 AM IST on January 11 in India.
