Credit & Copyright: Marcella Giulia Pace
Explanation:
What color is the Moon?
It depends on the night.
Outside of the Earth's atmosphere, the
dark Moon,
which shines by reflected sunlight, appears a
magnificently brown-tinged gray.
Viewed from inside the
Earth's atmosphere, though, the moon can appear quite different.
The featured
image highlights a collection of apparent colors of the full moon documented
by one astrophotographer over 10 years from
different locations across
Italy.
A
red or yellow colored moon usually indicates a moon seen near the horizon.
There, some of the
blue light has been scattered
away
by a long path through the
Earth's atmosphere,
sometimes laden with fine dust.
A blue-colored
moon is more rare and
can indicate a moon seen through an atmosphere carrying larger dust particles.
What created the purple moon is
unclear
--
it may be a combination of several effects.
The last image captures the
total lunar eclipse of 2018 July --
where the moon,
in Earth's shadow, appeared a
faint red -- due to light
refracted through
air around the
Earth.
Today there is not only another full moon but a
total lunar eclipse visible to observers
in North and
South America --
an occurrence that may lead to some
unexpected lunar colorings.
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NASA Official: Jay Norris. Specific rights apply.
A service of: LHEA at NASA / GSFC
& Michigan Tech. U.
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Moon - Luna
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