Harvest Moon and the End of Summer

Look out for the harvest moon tonight around 11p.m. ET

Before they get excited about the unbridled commercialism and crappy halftime show of the Super Bowl, American’s everywhere celebrate the death of summer during the Autumnal Equinox and its whispered promise of a glorious, incandescent harvest moon light show. Well, this year, America is in luck! Maybe other parts of the world are too, but that’s not important. Tonight, at a little after 11 p.m. Eastern Standard Time, we might just be in for a veritable fall fireworks show of heavenly proportions: namely, the moon’s going to look really big and blood red tonight! Woo hoo! For those of you who may be astronomy noobs, here’s a basic description of the conditions that need to be present to create a “super harvest moon”: every once in awhile (not in a blue moon, though, don’t get cute), the time difference between sunset and moonrise is shorter than normal, meaning that there is no great period of darkness between the two phenomena, and the evening will seem much brighter than normal. The “Harvest” designation of this particular full moon comes from earlier agrarian times, as the brighter conditions allowed farmers more time to bring in their September yields much later in the night. As an added bonus, this 2010 harvest moon will have a special guest that hasn’t shown up around the same time in over 47 years: Jupiter will be right next to the moon, shining brightly throughout the night.