Tonight … the sky of the Arab world witnesses the last full moon of 2020

6:05 p.m. Tuesday, December 29, 2020

Youssef Afifi wrote:

The sky of the Arab world is witnessing the “last full moon” of the year 2020 this evening, Tuesday, and the last also of the second decade of the 21st century (2011 to 2020), and we will see it all night.

Engineer Majed Abu Zahra, president of the Jeddah Astronomical Society, said the moon will rise above the northeast horizon at sunset and simulate the apparent path of the June sun as it follows the path high in the sky, and that it will radiate past the constellation of the twins, or where the sun will be after six months, so the completion of the December moon reminds us that the long daylight hours of June will return.

Abu Zahra added on the association’s official Facebook page that he will notice that the apparent size of the moon is large during its sunrise when it is near the horizon, and it can be red or orange, but after she gets up in the sky, her small size returns, and it’s just an optical illusion happening in the middle. Every lunar month.

He explained that the pink or orange color in which the moon can appear during its sunrise is due to the atmosphere of our planet, since its components scatter the white light reflected from the moon, so the colors of the blue spectrum of short wavelength are scattered and the colors of the long wavelength red spectrum reaching to our eyes, this is the same reason why we see the reddish setting sun.

He continued: This is followed by the arrival of the moon at the highest point in the sky at midnight, directly above the viewer’s head, and it will set on the northwest horizon with the northwest. sunrise Wednesday.

Abu Zahra added that it can be said that the moon is full all night, but scientifically we call the moon the full moon when the moon is at an angle of 180 degrees to the sun, which will happen tomorrow. morning, Wednesday, December 30, at 6:28 a.m. KSA time, and half of its orbit will be cut around. Land during the month.

On the other hand, the full moon will simulate the position of the June sun in the extreme north of the globe, north of the polar circle the full moon will play the role of the midnight sun in June, and the reverse occurs in the highest latitudes. southern regions where the moon remains full moon up to the horizon just like the sun in June.

This time of month is considered ideal for viewing radioactive craters on the moon’s surface through binoculars or a small telescope, unlike the rest of the terrain which appears flat due to the entire moon falling into the sun, these craters Radiant are deposits of shiny reflective material that extend from the center of craters outward for hundreds of kilometers. That these nozzles are of recent formation, and that the “Tycho” crater is the most radiant crater.

Over the coming nights, the moon will rise about an hour late each day, and after a few days it will only be seen in the dawn and early morning sky, and at that time it will reach the final square phase one week after the full moon phase.