×

Total lunar eclipse visible in Illinois Sunday night

By WCMY News May 13, 2022 | 5:42 PM

If the weather allows, people in this area will get to see the total lunar eclipse Sunday night. From 8:32pm to 9:28pm, you might see slow, slight changes in the moon’s apparent color as it moves through the outer part of Earth’s shadow. If you could be on the moon, you’d see the earth partially blocking the sun.

At 9:28pm, the partial phase starts. That’s when the moon starts moving into the darkest part of the shadow and it begins to look like a bite’s been taken out of the moon’s disk. From the parts of the moon within it, the sun would be blocked by the earth.

The moon’s totally in Earth’s central shadow at 10:29pm. The total phase lasts until 11:54pm. From then until 12:55am, you’ll see more of the moon brighten up until the disk is a fairly bright circle again, none of it in the central shadow.

Most people will consider the eclipse to be over. But the rest of it is actually the moon moving out of the outer part of the shadow until 1:51am. Earth is still blocking some sunlight from the moon’s surface until that time.