Penumbral Lunar Eclipse Sept. 16 Is Last of Three 2016 Lunar Eclipses

Summary: The penumbral lunar eclipse Sept. 16 closes 2016’s lineup of two penumbral lunar eclipses and one almost lunar eclipse.

penumbral lunar eclipse Friday, Sep. 16, 2016: SockPuppetForTomruen, Public Domain, via Wikimedia Commons

The penumbral lunar eclipse Sept. 16 is 2016’s final lunar eclipse and is viewable from the mid-Atlantic Ocean eastward to the mid-Pacific Ocean.

The four continents of Africa, Asia, Australia and Europe fall within the viewing path for Friday, Sept. 16’s penumbral lunar eclipse. Visibility occurs over all of the Indian Ocean and parts of the Arctic and Southern Oceans. The eclipse will be visible over portions of two continents: eastern Brazil in South America’s eastern bulge and part of Antarctica.

North America is the only continent that is completely excluded from the eclipse’s path of visibility. During the penumbral lunar eclipse Sept. 16, the moon is below the horizon for places in North America.

The penumbral lunar eclipse Sept. 16 has an expected total duration of 3 hours 59 minutes 17 seconds. It begins at 16:54:40 Universal Coordinated Time (UTC). Greatest eclipse, which is the instant of closest lunar passage to the axis of Earth’s shadow, takes place at 18:54:16.8 UTC. The eclipse ends at 20:53:57 UTC.

The penumbral lunar eclipse Sept. 16 takes place while the moon is in the constellation of Pisces the fish, notes retired NASA Goddard Space Flight Center (GSFC) astrophysicist Fred Espenak. Known as Mr. Eclipse, Espenak co-authored lunar and solar eclipse bulletins with meteorologist Jay Anderson of Environment Canada from 1993 through 2008.

graphics and details of penumbral lunar eclipse Friday, Sep. 16, 2016: "Permission is freely granted to reproduce this data when accompanied by an acknowledgment, Eclipse Predictions by Fred Espenak, NASA GSFC Emeritus," via NASA Eclipse Web Site

Solar eclipses are paired with lunar eclipses. A solar eclipse precedes or follows a lunar eclipse by about a fortnight, or approximately two weeks. The last lunar eclipse of 2016 happens a little over two weeks after Thursday, Sept. 1’s annular eclipse, which is the final of two solar eclipses in 2016.

A penumbral lunar eclipse is occasioned by the lunar passage through the Earth’s penumbra, which is the outer portion of Earth’s shadow. A penumbral shadow only blocks a portion of sunlight.

The penumbral lunar eclipse Sept. 16 is considered to be very deep. Its penumbral magnitude is 0.9080. Penumbral magnitude concerns the fraction of the lunar diameter that is occulted, or hidden, by Earth’s penumbra.

Of the three types of lunar eclipses, penumbral holds first place for number of occurrences in the 21st century. Of 228 lunar eclipses, penumbral make 86 showings. Second-place total lunar eclipses have 85 occurrences. Third-place partial eclipses account for 57 events.

On Sunday, Sept. 18, two days after the eclipse’s ending, the moon reaches the month’s perigee, the nearest point in the lunar orbit to Earth. September’s perigee takes place at 17:01 UTC. The center-to-center distance between Earth and moon will be 361,893 kilometers (224,869.88 miles).

Proxigee, which is the closest perigee for a particular year, occurs close to two months after Sept. 16’s penumbral lunar eclipse. Proxigee for 2016 happens Monday, Nov. 14, at 11:24 UTC. The center-to-center distance between Earth and moon will be 356,511 kilometers (22,1525.66 miles).

On Tuesday, Sept. 6, almost 10 days before eclipse starts, the moon reaches September’s apogee, or farthest distance from Earth. At 18:45 UTC, the center-to-center distance will be 405,057 kilometers (251,690.75 miles). The greatest apogee for 2016 happened Aug. 10. The center-to-center distance was 404,265 kilometers (251,198.62 miles).

The next penumbral lunar eclipse in the 21st century occurs Saturday, Feb. 11, as the first lunar eclipse of 2017. North America joins Africa, Asia and South America as the eclipse’s geographic regions of visibility. Australia is excluded from the path of visibility.

Almost six months later, a partial eclipse takes place Monday, Aug. 7, as the second and final lunar eclipse of 2017. North America is excluded from the path of visibility, but Australia joins Europe, Africa and Asia as regions for viewing 2017's partial eclipse.

The takeaway for 2016's penumbral lunar eclipse Sept. 16, is that geographic regions, such as North America, that are excluded from the viewing area for 2016's final eclipse only have to wait less than five months to fall in the path of visibility for 2017's first lunar eclipse.

penumbral lunar eclipse Friday, Sep. 16, 2016, as viewed from center of moon during the greatest eclipse: Tom Ruen (SockPuppetForTomruen), Public Domain, via Wikimedia Commons

Acknowledgment

My special thanks to talented artists and photographers/concerned organizations who make their fine images available on the internet.

Image credits:

penumbral lunar eclipse Friday, Sep. 16, 2016: Tom Ruen (SockPuppetForTomruen), Public Domain, via Wikimedia Commons @ https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Lunar_eclipse_chart_close-2016Sep16.png

graphics and details of penumbral lunar eclipse Friday, Sep. 16, 2016: "Permission is freely granted to reproduce this data when accompanied by an acknowledgment, Eclipse Predictions by Fred Espenak, NASA GSFC Emeritus," via NASA Eclipse Web Site @ http://eclipse.gsfc.nasa.gov/LEplot/LEplot2001/LE2016Sep16N.pdf

penumbral lunar eclipse Friday, Sep. 16, 2016, as viewed from center of moon during the greatest eclipse: Tom Ruen (SockPuppetForTomruen), Public Domain, via Wikimedia Commons @ https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Lunar_eclipse_from_moon-2016Sep16.png

For further information:

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