CYPRUS: Blood Moon to appear for longest lunar eclipse

A blood moon will appear in the night sky around much of the world on Friday night as the moon moves into the shadow of the earth for the longest lunar eclipse this Century. 

The total eclipse will last 1 hour, 42 minutes and 57 seconds, though a partial eclipse precedes and follows, meaning the moon will spend a total of 3 hours and 54 minutes in the earth’s umbral shadow, according to NASA. 

The eclipse will be visible from Europe, Africa and the Middle East between sunset and midnight on July 27 and then between midnight and sunrise on July 28 in much of Asia and Australia. 

“It’s called a blood moon because the light from the sun goes through the earth’s atmosphere on its way to the moon and the earth’s atmosphere turns it red in the same way that when the sun goes down it goes red,” Andrew Fabian, professor of astronomy at the University of Cambridge. 

When the moon moves into the conical shaped shadow of the earth, it goes from being illuminated by the sun to being dark. Some light, though, will still reach the moon because it is bent by the earth’s atmosphere. 

The same day, Mars will be at its brightest as it travels close to earth, so observers may be able to see what looks like an orange-red star which is in fact the so called red planet.

The eclipse of the moon will not be visible from North America or most of the Pacific. The next lunar eclipse of such a length is due in 2123.