Shadows in the sky

Has that superstitious could get better about his superior understanding of eclipses tribal people held in many adventure stories. A classic example is the Hergé, prisoners of the Sun when young reporter Tintin scares around the Sun extinguish his captors with his apparent power.

One of the first writers to use this convenient plot device was H. Rider Haggard in King Solomon's mines. But when Haggard appeared his history, his understanding of eclipses was not perfect unfortunately far. Until corrected in a later Edition, implies the history that the Moon is full on the nights before and after the eclipses of the Sun. But they occur when the Moon between the Sun and the Earth passes while the Moon is full, if it is on the opposite side of the earth around the Sun. There is always a gap between an Eclipse of the Sun and the full moon preceding or after two weeks.

Eclipses of the Moon, instead of only at full moon (although not on every full moon). She appears, when the Moon enters the earth shadow.

During a total solar eclipse of the railways along the moon shadow a the middle band on Earth surface up to 272 km (169 km) wide. Within this band all sunlight for a few minutes is cut off, the sky darkens and the stars come. By chance the Moon and the Sun appears, almost the exact same size of the earth so that the Moon effectively normally by an own intense light visible wiped out includes the Sun during a solar eclipse so. features from the Sun, to the dark side of the moon. Corona, the Sun's "Atmosphere", knows how to see red prominences - clouds of hydrogen and a Jardin.

The Earth's shadow is large enough to completely cover the Moon in an Eclipse of the moon. Sometimes passes by the edge of the shadow of the Moon and it just seems to fade a little. Thus there to be a total eclipse of the Moon, it must enter the central part of the shadow.

But even then, the Moon is not completely hidden - some rays of the Sun, bent by the Earth's atmosphere on they fall. Since only light at the red end of the spectrum in the just the right angle, turn to illuminate the Moon, our takes silver trusts a beautiful satellite then deep copper hue.