Skygazers across the world better be ready to catch this week’s supermoon. The next one won’t come around for a bit. But on Thursday, the fourth and last supermoon of the year will pass within roughly 225,000 miles of Earth, appearing larger and brighter than usual. It will take until Friday to attain its full lunar phase. While seeing a supermoon in itself is a delight, the Leonid meteor shower could make for a dazzling bonus as it reaches its peak on Saturday night and into early Sunday, reported CNN quoting the American Meteor Society.

The full moon in November is referred to as “the beaver moon,” a reference to the start of the animal’s hibernating season. The upcoming full moon will reach the summit of its full phase on Friday at 4:29 pm Eastern Time. However, it will be visible to the naked eye as full one day prior to and after its peak, said Noah Petro, chief of NASA’s Planetary Geology, Geophysics and Geochemistry Laboratory.

Petro said, “There is a moment in time when the moon is at its fullest, but if it’s cloudy or you’re busy, going out any other time either a day before, later in the evening or the following day you will still see the beauty that is the full moon.”

A supermoon, more of a popular word than a scientific one, happens when a full lunar phase coincides with an exceptionally close orbit around the Earth. This phenomenon occurs only three or four times a year and consecutively because of the moon’s ever-changing oval orbit.

The full moon in November will be a little further away than the one in October, which was the closest moon of 2024 and was photographed worldwide.

If local weather conditions allow, the beaver moon will be visible to those in the Northern and Southern Hemispheres. They may even be able to witness a Leonid meteor burning brightly in the night sky.

Hurricane Idalia is crawling towards the Florida Gulf Coast, forcing mass evacuations in low-lying areas that are expected to be swamped once the Category 3 storm makes landfall on Wednesday morning (local time). It is expected to intensify into a Category 4 storm. What’s concerning is that the rare super blue moon, that’s coinciding with the hurricane’s landfall, can play a role in exacerbating flooding from the storm. The moon will be closest to Earth on Wednesday, for the second time this month.

While a supermoon can make for a spectacular backdrop in photos of landmarks around the world, its intensified gravitational pull also makes tides higher. And its impact will be visible not only in Florida but in Georgia and South Carolina too, according to Sky News.

Known as a king tide, these higher tides are caused by the extra gravitational pull that occurs when the sun and moon align with Earth.

“I would say the timing is pretty bad for this one,” Brian Haines, the meteorologist in charge at the National Weather Service office in Charleston, South Carolina, is quoted as saying by the outlet.

Idalia is expected to hit Florida’s coast at 6am (local time) on Wednesday.

New York Post said that the hurricane is still over 100 miles off the coast, but the rising tides have washed onto highways and overfilled canals.

Some users on X (formerly Twitter) have posted videos of the high-speed winds ripping through palm trees and kicking up miniature sand storms. NDTV cannot verify the authenticity of these viral clips.

At 11 pm on Tuesday, Idalia was carrying maximum sustained winds of 110 mph (177 kmph) and moving north at 18 mph (29 kmph), the National Hurricane Centre said.

Representational file image.
| Photo Credit: Rajeev Bhatt

Stargazers are in for a double treat this week: a rare blue supermoon with Saturn peeking from behind.

The cosmic curtain rises Wednesday night with the second full moon of the month, the reason it’s considered blue. It’s dubbed a supermoon because it’s closer to Earth than usual, appearing especially big and bright.

This will be the closest full moon of the year, just 222,043 miles (357,344 kilometers) or so away. That’s more than 100 miles (160 kilometers) closer than the Aug. 1 supermoon.

As a bonus, Saturn will be visible as a bright point 5 degrees to the upper right of the moon at sunset in the east-southeastern sky, according to NASA. The ringed planet will appear to circle clockwise around the moon as the night wears on.

If you missed the month’s first spectacle, better catch this one. There won’t be another blue supermoon until 2037, according to Italian astronomer Gianluca Masi, founder of the Virtual Telescope Project.

Clouds spoiled Masi’s attempt to livestream the supermoon rising earlier this month. He’s hoping for clearer skies this time so he can capture the blue supermoon shining above St. Peter’s Basilica at the Vatican.

Weather permitting, observers don’t need binoculars or telescopes — “just their own eyes.” said Masi.

“I’m always excited to admire the beauty of the night sky,” he said, especially when it features a blue supermoon.

The first supermoon of 2023 was in July. The fourth and last will be in September.