Perigee moon

[randy_byers]

Via Dian Crayne on trufen I see that this weekend will feature the biggest full moon of the year: 'It's a "perigee Moon" as much as 14% wider and 30% brighter than lesser Moons we'll see later in 2009.'

A shot taken last night on Kolyskaya peninsula in Russia shows a gorgeous ice halo around the moon. Looks like something out of Polanski's Dance of the Vampires.

Comments

[holyoutlaw.livejournal.com]

Sigh. If only we could see it! Oh well.

That photo is really gorgeous. If you look in the lower left hand section of the halo (around 7 or 8 o'clock), you can see the belt and a couple of the shoulder stars of Orion. Yeah!

[randy-byers.livejournal.com]

I thought I'd heard it was supposed to be clear this weekend, so maybe we will be able to see it.

Huh, nope, now I see were supposed to get rain tomorrow.

Hadn't noticed Orion's belt in that photo. Very cool.

[eddvick.livejournal.com]

I can kinda sorta combine your two stories. We were outside last night and saw a rainbow halo around the moon! It was cool, a bit startling.

[randy-byers.livejournal.com]

Oops, I didn't make it clear in my original post that the ice halo in the Russian photo is around the moon. I've fixed that. But yeah, rainbow around the moon is pretty fricking cool in itself. But where's the pot of gold in a circular rainbow?

[stevegreen.livejournal.com]

Ah, if only I didn't live near (a) a city, (b) a town, (c) an airport.

[randy-byers.livejournal.com]

If only I didn't live under a cloud!