Lunar eclipse at the bottom of the world
Like other parts of the world, we got to witness the lunar eclipse on August 28.
Our resident astronomer and professional photographer Robert Schwarz was out all night armed with an arsenal of cameras and giddy with excitement. He was worried that we would be skunked with clouds and poor visibility that night but instead we lucked out with incredibly beautiful weather and clear views of the show.
We had great views of the moon out on the back decks of the station over towards the cryo barn. The earth's shadow started creeping over the face of the moon around 8:30pm and the total eclipse occurred from about 10-10:30pm.
Robert has a great website here with loads of his beautiful photos from this winter and previous winters (this is his 6th winter). His lunar eclipse photos were also featured at SpaceWeather.com on the front page, quite an honor!
We are now seeing a nice pink tinge on the horizon where the sun is circling around us, although it's still pretty dark out. It will only get lighter and lighter from here on out until the sun emerges from below the horizon around September 21 and then the 6 month-long day will begin. For now, it's a lovely dawn full of promise...
posted by Heidi @ 9:45 AM
2 comments
2 Comments:
These are great photos! It would have been an amazing experience to witness the lunar eclipse from the south pole, with auroras as well! I saw the eclipse from here in Sydney, although by the time I had finished work it mid-eclipse had passed. It was a very dark eclipse this time (almost as dark as the one in 1993) and not quite as spectacular for me as several I saw in the early 80s when the moon was bright orange. But it was a great show nonetheless and I tried taking photos of the moon as it was coming out of totality. They turned out OK for someone who knows nothing about photography, and I even submitted several to
Spaceweather.com. Needless to say mine weren't published!!!!!
PS it was me who posted the previous comment, but for some reason I have been kept anonymous!!!
You must be getting excited about leaving the ice.
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