The Lunar Eclipse

Thursday, 21st February , 2008

We visited Sir Patrick Moore to witness the lunar eclipse from the garden of his Selsey home. Totality wasn’t until 03.00am and so there was plenty of time to chat and eat a rather splendid Astronomer’s Chilli. And as this was an evening celebrating our return to the moon, Terry presented Sir Patrick with a signed Elephant Rising depicting Leonard of Quirm, Carrot, Rincewind and the Librarian standing on the moon of Discworld.

The moon entered the penumbra at 00:35am, and the umbra at 01:43am.  Totality was from 03:00am to 03:51am, with mid-eclipse being at 03:26am, although heavy cloud cover made viewing difficult.