Those who are awake in the wee hours of Election Day this year will be treated to a blood red lunar eclipse – if the rain lets up long enough for Oregonians to see it.
The total lunar eclipse on the morning of Tuesday, Nov. 8 will be the last one for nearly three years, according to NASA, as we reach the end of a cycle that saw one to two total lunar eclipses almost every year from 2018 to 2022, most recently in May.
Not all of those lunar eclipses have been visible in the Pacific Northwest, but the one on Election Day definitely will be, with all of the western U.S. squarely in the path of totality, according to forecasts.
In Portland, the eclipse will technically begin just after midnight on Nov. 8, according to Time and Date, beginning the partial phase at 1:09 a.m. with the full eclipse starting at 2:16 a.m. The full eclipse will end at 3:41 a.m., and the whole event will be done by 6 a.m.
The big question, as always, is whether Oregonians will be able to actually see the astronomical event, or whether clouds will once again obscure it from view. The National Weather Service is currently forecasting mostly cloudy skies Monday night into Tuesday morning in Portland, with rain showers likely. Anyone hoping to watch the eclipse in Oregon might be better off heading east of the Cascade Mountains, though chances are slim even there – forecasters are calling for mostly cloudy skies from Bend up to Pendleton and out to Burns.
A total lunar eclipse takes place when the Earth moves between the sun and the moon, casting a shadow across the face of a full moon. Refracted sunlight turns the moon a shade of red before it darkens completely.
Eclipses that don’t fully cast the moon into shadow are known as partial and penumbral lunar eclipses. A penumbral eclipse will take place over Oregon on March 24, 2024, and a partial eclipse will follow on Sept. 17, 2024.
The next total lunar eclipse, which takes place on March 13, 2025, will also be visible from the Pacific Northwest – weather permitting.
— Jamie Hale
503-294-4077; jhale@oregonian.com; @HaleJamesB
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