Full moon near Mars on December 23

[Killer360]

If you're lucky and living in the CST or PST time zone, you'll be able to still catch this!!

This only happens once every 50 years!!!!





For us in the U.S., the full moon is tonight.

And if you look outside you'll see this full moon near a blazing reddish light in our sky. It's the planet Mars. Flying through space at 18 miles per second, Earth is about to go between the sun and Mars. Earth will pass between Mars and the sun tomorrow. So the distance between us and Mars is now about at its least for this two-year period, and Mars won't come anywhere near this close again until the year 2010.

That's why Mars appears bright in our sky. It's as bright as the brightest star, Sirius. And Mars is the brightest object near tonight's moon. Be sure to look for Mars' reddish color. By the way, tonight's full moon is the full moon closest to the December solstice. Standing opposite the sun in our sky, tonight's full moon closely mirrors the position of the June sun. In fact, this full moon is the northernmost full moon of the year.

For the northern hemisphere, the Full Long Night Moon – with Mars nearby – will climb high by midnight tonight. Just be sure to look for the very brilliant star-like object shining near the moon tonight.

By the way, the full moon comes at the same moment for everyone worldwide, but our clocks say different times. The December full moon falls at precisely 1:16 Monday morning Universal Time. In the Americas, the full moon falls during the evening hours tonight. For the world's Eastern Hemisphere, it'll be after midnight Monday when the moon turns full. No matter where you live, a full-looking moon shines from dusk till dawn tonight.

Our thanks today to Research Corporation, a foundation for the advancement of science.

http://www.earthsky.org/radioshows/51934/full-moon-near-mars-on-december-23

[Newby]

PST. Hells yeah!

[AntiVirus]

Woah, very cool.  I didn't know that. :D

[d00m]

Didn't know that either...  :o Damn.. MST.

[Armin]

Didn't know that either...  :o Damn.. MST.

MST is directly in the middle of PST and CST, so you would've been fine at the time this was posted.

[Hitmen]

It was super cloudy and rainy here :(

[Sidoh]

Pretty neat!  My dad got a new digital camera a few days ago, so I tried it out.  I had very little idea what I was doing and I didn't have a tripod, though, so they didn't turn out super-well.

http://sidoh.dark-wire.net/00012.jpg
http://sidoh.dark-wire.net/00015.jpg

[Killer360]

Pretty neat!  My dad got a new digital camera a few days ago, so I tried it out.  I had very little idea what I was doing and I didn't have a tripod, though, so they didn't turn out super-well.

http://sidoh.dark-wire.net/00012.jpg
http://sidoh.dark-wire.net/00015.jpg

That's pretty good. :)

[iago]

I love how your camera zooms in more than the telescope I had as a kid.. :)