On the evening of May 5, eyes fixed on the sky for the penumbral lunar eclipse, which from Italy was only visible in the final stages. The event, less striking than total or partial eclipses but still fascinating, began around 17:15, when the Moon entered the penumbral cone projected by the Earth, i.e. in the outer part of the Earth’s shadow. The lunar disk did not darken but appeared only weakly veiled: the climax was reached at 19:24, when the Moon was still below the horizon for us, while it was clearly visible from Antarctica, Asia, Russia, Oceania and Central-East Africa. The exit from the cone of penumbra, around 21:30, marked the end of the phenomenon.
“The penumbral eclipse is an elusive but undoubtedly interesting show, if only to test oneself in grasping the slight decrease in brightness of the lunar disk due to the shielding of sunlight determined by the Earth”, explains the astrophysicist Gianluca Masi, scientific director of the Virtual Telescope. “The evidence of the shadow is modest, and the brightness of the full moon can make it more difficult to appreciate, but certainly not impossible: the effect is more visible in the end than you think.”
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2023-05-05 20:03:00
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