Total Lunar Eclipse on 15th/16th June

A Lunar eclipse occurs during an alignment of the Sun, Earth and Full Moon, resulting in the Full Moon gradually darkening as it moves into the Earth’s shadow.

In Singapore, this eclipse occurs in the early morning hours of Thursday 16th June. It is the longest lunar eclipse since July 16th 2000.

Timings
1:22am – Penumbral phase – The Moon enters the outer edge of Earth’s Shadow (penumbra). This shadow maybe light and not very obvious.
2:22am – Umbral Phase – The Moon enters the darker, inner part of Earth’s shadow (umbra). Over the course of an hour, the dark grey shadow gradually moves across the face of the Moon.
3:22am-5:02am – Totality – The Moon is completely covered by the Umbra and turns red/orange in colour.
5:02 – 2nd Umbral phase – The Moon reaches the opposite edge of Earth’s umbral shadow. It begins to reappear as the shadow gradually recedes across its surface.
6:02 – 2nd Penumbral phase – The Moon is completely visible again, although not at full brightness as it is still inside the lighter, penumbral shadow.
7:00am – Eclipse ends – The Moon exits the penumbral shadow of the Earth’s and returns to full brightness. At this point the Moon may be too low to see.


How to observe the lunar eclipse:
Lunar eclipses do not require any special equipment to be seen.
They are easily visible to the naked eye, due to the Moon’s large apparent size and brightness.
Choice of location is important. As this eclipse occurs in the early hours of the morning, observers must have a clear view of the west direction, unobstructed by trees or tall buildings.
Open parks, fields and reservoirs often make good locations.
Avoid brightly lit areas.

Join us at the Red Moon Spectacle Event, at The Lakeside @ Omni-Theatre (Jurong Town Hall Road, besides Snow City).
Bring a mat and observe the eclipse overlooking Jurong Lake, as well as outdoor movie screenings starting from 11pm.

WEATHER WARNING:
In the event of thick clouds and/or rain, the lunar eclipse will not be visible.

I love the mooooon!

Scobbers are just back from STAR+MOON gazing tonight! The widely publicised event for the partial lunar eclipse saw more than 3000 visitors tonight. Thank you for visiting the Observatory!

Enthusiastic visitors under a beautiful evening sky

Yong and our wonderful volunteers

Setting up and making some final checks before visitors use the telescopes...

Attentive visitors enjoying an interesting talk by a NASA professional

Crowds going crazy over the delicious snacks!

After a long wait, we were finally awarded with a glimpse of the beautiful eclipsed moon, peeping from behind the JTC building. When the moon finally rose from behind the JTC building, we used telescopes and binoculars to look at the interesting shadow cast by the earth on the full moon. The shadowed part of the moon looks a bit greyish, and using binoculars, we could make out some details.

Did not get a chance to capture a photo through the telescopes. It looked something like this.

So what did we look at tonight? We were so lucky to get a clear night sky, very very rare given the recent rainy weather. We saw Scorpius, Southern Cross (Crux), Alpha Centauri, Jewel Box, the Big Dipper, Saturn, Venus, Virgo, Libra, Saggitarius and so on. It was an awesome evening.

Some visitors enquired about the Google Sky application on the Android phone. As mentioned in a previous post, it is an excellent tool for stargazing. It is also available for free on the Android Market. So at the moment as far as I know, you have to own an Android phone to use the app. Some examples of an Android phone will be several HTC models, as well as Motorola Milestone, and Samsung Galaxy S.

It was a spectacular night, and I believe many visitors couldn't get enough. Fret not, the Science Centre OBservatory is open every Friday night 8pm to 10pm, and the main telescope in the dome will be opened up for public viewing.

Entrance is free and all members of the public are welcome. Stay tuned, and see you at the Science Centre OBservatory soon!

Note: Title of post is copied from Sponge Monkeys - We Like the Moon. It is so funny. Check out the embedded video below.

Friday 15th Jan - Partial Solar Eclipse

Watch this eclipse at Science Centre OBservatory!
Observatory opens at 3pm
Free eclipse glasses for every visitor

How to view an eclipse
Bring a mat (to sit on)
Bring a hat or an umbrella (for shade)
Wear eclipse glasses (for protection)
or use a Pinhole (we'll show you how)

Viewing the sun from Science Centre Observatory

One certain sweltering sunny day in December, Scobbers hosted a group of students very interested in Astronomy. We brought the kids and teachers up to our big 16-inch (40cm) Cassegrain Reflector telescope, where we viewed the sun through a sun filter. FYI: The sun filter looks like a mirror and covers the whole front end of the telescope for safe viewing of the sun by reducing glare.

Sky was clear, there were no clouds blocking our view of the sun, and the resulting image is an orangey sun against a black background. Andrew pointed out some sunspots to the kids, and we caught it on the 2 photos below. Can you see the sunspots at the top right hand corner in the picture?

Viewing the sun in the Observatory dome is a very sweaty affair, and dangerous too. The sun's rays when focused through the telescope, could so easily burn a hole in the dome's carpet, that we better not talk about your eyes. So necessary precautions had to be taken as mentioned above. But it was very different from the usual night sky viewing, and I think you should try it too.

15 January 2009, we are going to view the sun again at SCOB. Time is 2.30PM to 5.30PM at where the Observatory dome is. Why a Friday afternoon!? Because there will be a solar eclipse! Although just a partial one, but a spectacular event to be sure, IF the sky is not too cloudy. Expect the sun to look like a "half-eaten cookie".

As the date draws nearer, we'll post more details on the scob blog.

Hope to see you on the 15th! Meanwhile, Happy 2010!

Eclipse Event 22 July 2009

RAIN STOPPED PLAY!!!!
If there was ever a day to remember that in the world of Earth-based astronomy the weather is king, it was today.
Heavy cloud and persistant rain made sure that this morning's Solar Eclipse was well and truly eclipsed, meaning to say that we and many others didn't see a thing.

Despite the rain an estimated 300 or so optimistic visitors came to the observatory at 8:30am.

As our motto says: The show must gone!
Actually, we don't have a motto, but in cases such as this it seemed appropriate.
With no eclipse and no live webcasts we did the only thing we could.......FAKE IT!

Now, when I say fake it, I don't mean use somebody's head and film it moving slowly in front of a bright light, no no no!
I mean we used our trusty software Starry Night Pro Plus to show people an animation of what the eclipse would look like if there were clear skies.

About 100 or so people stuck around for this "simulated eclipse" and a brief tour of the observatory. However, some were a little surprised when they saw just how small a 10% eclipse actually is and also that Singapore will not see a total solar eclipse until the year 2168.

There is a brief video report on the event currently available on Straits Times Razor TV:


Below are some photos of the event:

Above: Alfred setting up live webcast outside classroom.

Below: The webcast showing that even in China there was rain

Above: Yong got his picture in the paper (Lianhe Zaobao) treating visitors to a tour and Q&A session at the main telescope.