Tonight : Moon Will Glow Red

in a rare, long eclipse, the moon will turn into a glowing red ball, tonight. it is the century’s longest total lunar eclipse – 3 hours and 40 minutes.

i love looking at the sky. the fluff of the clouds, the velvety night sky. i LOVE looking at the moon and the stars, especially on a clear night where the moon is so visibly huge, round and glowing. i will be in awe, and i will not be able to keep my eyes away from the moon. as a child, it always fascinates me that the moon ‘follows’ my abah’s car! hihi.

also, on a clear night, i will never miss looking for the orion’s belt constellation of stars. amazing. simply beautiful and amazing. a string of 3 stars that are forever constant and aligned together. Allahuakbar.

so this lunar eclipse thing is something interesting that i will look into!

 

a lunar eclipse occurs when the moon passes behind the earth so that the earth blocks the sun's rays from striking the moon. this can occur only when the sun, earth, and moon are aligned exactly, or very closely so, with the earth in the middle. hence, there is always a full moon the night of a lunar eclipse.

 

 

in UAE (united arab emirates) the moon will start turning grey at 9:23pm when it will enter the penumbra (the early shadow of the earth). the earth's core shadow called umbra will start covering the moon exactly an hour later at 10:23pm.

the shadow will completely cover the moon at 11:22pm. the eclipse will end at 1:03am UAE time after a whopping three hours and 40 minutes. it will be visible almost everywhere in the world except north america.

 

 

we learned this in school, but i honestly have forgotten! all the umbras and penumbras! it’s good to polish up. i’ll impress khaleef later. hihi.

 

 

read this. wow. and imagine you’re flying off into space, and looking at earth during the lunar eclipse!

What makes the eclipsed moon turn red? The answer lies inside Earth's shadow:

Our planet casts a long shadow. It starts on the ground--Step outside at night. You're in Earth's shadow. Think about it!--and it stretches almost a million miles into space, far enough to reach the moon.

Suppose you had a personal spaceship. Here's your mission: Tonight, at midnight, blast off and fly down the middle of Earth's shadow. Keep going until you're about 200,000 miles above Earth, almost to the moon. Now turn around and look down. The view from your cockpit window is Earth's nightside, the dark half of our planet opposite the sun. But it's not completely dark! All around Earth's limb, the atmosphere glows red.

What you're seeing is every sunrise and sunset on Earth--all at once. This ring of light shines into Earth's shadow, breaking the utter darkness you might expect to find there. Turn off the cockpit lights. There's a lovely red glow.

source : nasa.

 

this picture describes how it would look like if you were standing on the moon, looking at earth during a lunar eclipse. woah.

 

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in Islam, there should be no superstition associated with the eclipse. muslims offer prayer at the time of the eclipse.

apakah hukum solat sunat gerhana?

hukumnya adalah sunat muakkadah atau pun sunat yang digalakkan.

ini berdasarkan daripada hadis yang diriwayatkan oleh Imam Muslim yang bermakna, Rasulullah SAW bersabda : sesungguhnya matahari dan bulan merupakan dua tanda daripada tanda-tanda (kebesaran) Allah, tidak berlaku gerhana pada kedua-duanya kerana kematiaan seseorang dan tidak pula kerana kelahirannya. maka apabila kamu melihat perkara itu maka sembahyanglah dan berdoalah sehingga kembali terang (hilang gerhana) apa dengan kamu.

lafaz niat solat sunat gerhana bulan

أُصَلِّى سُنَّةَ الخُسُوفِ رَكْعَتَينِ للهِ تَعَالَى

ertinya : “sahaja aku solat sunat gerhana bulan dua rakaat kerana Allah Taala.”

cara dilakukan solat gerhana :

i. solat gerhana dilakukan sekurang-kurangnya 2 rakaat seperti solat sunat biasa. ia adalah yang sekurang-kurangnya. yang akmalnya dilakukan dengan dua kali ruku’ dan 2 kali qiyam, pada tiap-tiap satu rakaat dengan tidak dipanjangkan bacaan pada kedua-dua rakaat.

ii. yang terlebih akmal ialah dengan 2 rakaat, dengan 2 ruku dan qiyam bagi tiap-tiap satu rakaat dengan dipanjangkan bacaan pada kedua-dua rakaat.

bila boleh dilakukan? waktunya bermula ketika berlakunya gerhana dan berakhir dengan hilangnya gerhana tersebut dan keadaan menjadi seperti sedia kala.

untuk lebih lanjut, klik sini. takpun korang tengok video ni, penerangan dari ustaz rasul dahri tentang solat sunat gerhana ni. ade lagi 3 clip, korang bole sambung je la kat youtube ok. hihi.

 

 

Allah knows best.

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the next lunar eclipse with this length will only occur in 2141. so grab this chance to witness this rare phenomena.

(*images taken from wikipedia & google)