LRO and the Lunar Eclipse of April 15, 2014: Shadow View
In the early morning hours of April 15, 2014, the Moon enters the Earth’s shadow, creating a total lunar eclipse, the first of four that are visible in the Western Hemisphere in the next two years. This animation shows the changing appearance of the Moon as it travels into and out of the Earth’s shadow, along with the times at various stages. Versions of the animation have been created for each of the four time zones of the contiguous United States.
All of North and South America will see this eclipse, and you won’t need special equipment to see it. Just stay up late, go outside and look up!
The penumbra is the part of the Earth’s shadow where the Sun is only partially covered by the Earth. The umbra is where the Sun is completely hidden.
The animation includes the position of the Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter spacecraft. LRO is powered by sunlight, but during the eclipse, it will have to rely on its battery for almost three hours.
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Please give credit for this item to:
NASA's Scientific Visualization Studio
- Ernie Wright (USRA) [Lead]
MissionsThis visualization is related to the following missions:
Datasets used in this visualization
LRO WAC 643nm High Sun Global MosaicID: 803Mosaic Collected with LROC
LRO DEM (Digital Elevation Map)ID: 653Collected with LOLA
DE421 (JPL DE421)ID: 752Ephemeris NASA/JPL
Note: While we identify the data sets used in these visualizations, we do not store any further details, nor the data sets themselves on our site.