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A bright full moon rises at NASA’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida in 2017.
NASA / Kim Shiflett
Halloween may It looks different this year due to coronavirus restrictions, but at least we can enjoy a spooky spectacle in the sky: a rare second full moon in the month to crown a month of glorious observation of the sky.
The full moon that will be visible on October 31 is called the blue moon because it is the second full moon of the same month, after the harvest moon from October 1 to October 3. And in a rare treat, the Halloween 2020 Full Moon will be visible to everyone, rather than just parts of it, for the first time since WWII.
“When I was teaching, my high school students thought there was a full moon every Halloween,” astronomy educator and former planetarium director Jeffrey Hunt told me. Not quite, although pop culture decorations make it look like that. The last Halloween full moon visible around the world came in 1944, he said. He has written about the event on his website, When the Curves Line Up. There was a Halloween full moon in some places in 1955, but that did not include western North America and the western Pacific, Hunt says.
While this year’s Halloween full moon will be visible in all parts of the world, that does not mean that all citizens will have a view. Residents of North and South America will see it, as will Africa, all of Europe, and much of Asia. But while Western Australians will see it, those in the central and eastern parts of the country will not.
Do you know the time zones well? “All time zones have it, except those east of (GMT) +8 time zones if they have daylight saving time, or (GMT) +9 without daylight saving time,” says Hunt.
Do you want to see the full moon on Halloween? It’s so bright in full phase that it doesn’t matter if you’re in a crowded city or on the farm. And you don’t need expensive equipment.
“Get out there and take a look,” Hunt says.
However, don’t be surprised if you take a photo of the Halloween moon with your phone and the photo doesn’t match what you saw.
“When you photograph the moon with a smartphone, the results can be disappointing,” admits Hunt. “A telephoto accessory will help enlarge the moon.”
If you’re too busy watching horror movies (or doing whatever the coronavirus equivalent of trick-or-treating), you’ll have to wait until 2039 for another global full moon.
“Of course, full moons occur in October during the intervening years, but not on Halloween,” says Hunt. And a Halloween full moon may appear in your region before then. It just won’t be seen on everyone.
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