After the Beaver Supermoon that we admired on November 5ththe show of Supermoon returns for the second consecutive month: the night between 4 and 5 December will shine Supermoon of Long Nights. Our satellite will appear larger and brighter than usual, not to be missed!
What is meant by Supermoon
As we always specify, the definition of Supermoon, first of all, has never been confirmed byInternational Astronomical Unionso it remains unofficial.
That said, Supermoon often means what the astrologer wrote Richard Nolle in 1979, according to which a full moon or a new moon is “Super” if it reaches at least 90% of its maximum perigee (the point of the lunar orbit closest to our Planet). In other words, a supermoon is a moon that is no more than 361,885 km from Earth, measured from the centers of the two celestial bodies.
As he explains TimeanddateIn fact, the Moon’s orbit around the Earth is not a perfect circle, but elliptical, with one side closer to the Earth than the other. As a result, the distance between the Moon and the Earth varies throughout the month and year (on average, this distance is about 382,900 kilometers).
Compared to a micromoon, i.e. a full moon close to its apogee (the point of its orbit furthest from our Planet), a Supermoon can appear up to 13-14% larger and up to 27-30% brighter.
Because (Super) Moon of Long Nights
The full moon in December is called the Moon of the Long Nights in the American tradition in reference to the nights of the boreal winter, the longest of the year (but the real cold also arrives and therefore this full moon is also called Cold Moon).
But Native Americans are not the only ones who have given names to full moons: the December full moon is in fact also known as Moon before YuleWhere Yule it is the winter solstice, a name given by people of Celtic origin.
In fact, the word seems to derive from the Scandinavian or Anglo-Saxon one ‘Iul‘, or from Norwegian “jul” which means “wheel”, indicating a date that marks the definitive point in the Wheel of the Year, when, in the Northern Hemisphere, one lives the longest night of the year.
How and when to admire the Long Nights Supermoon
The Moon will technically be full on December 5th at 0.14 Italian timebut already from the evening of the 4th, after sunset, we will be able to admire the show. We raise our eyes to the sky on the south-eastern horizon, towards the constellation of Taurus (on the map the sky on December 4th at approximately 11.00 pm).
This moon, at perigee, will be 357,219 km from our planettherefore “officially” super.
To be missed!
Sources: Moongiant / Timeanddate / UAI
