A Lunar Eclipse in Three Exposures
Credit & Copyright:
Stephen Barnes
Our Moon turned red last week.
The reason was that during the night of January 20, a total lunar eclipse occurred.
The
above digitally superimposed photographs captured the
Moon three times during this
lunar eclipse, once just as the Moon entered the Earth's
shadow,
once when the Moon was near the middle of the
shadow,
and once just before the Moon exited.
The red tint of the
eclipsed Moon is created by sunlight
first passing through the Earth's atmosphere,
which preferentially scatters blue light (making the
sky blue) but passes and
refracts red light, before reflecting back off the Moon.
Differing amounts of
clouds and
volcanic dust in the Earth's atmosphere make each
lunar eclipse appear differently.