Moon emitting really strong light

Yesterday when I was downstairs watching scrubs on tv I opened the back door to my garden to look at the moon because it seemed so bright outside for being 11 p.m. When I looked at the moon I almost had to look away for a while because the light was so strong. It was stronger than the street lights close my garden. It even made the furniture in my garden cast really dark shadows. My whole garden was lit up by the moon. It wasn't by the lamps because they never light up my garden at night.

I wanted to film it but I don't have a camera. So I borrowed my bro's cell phone to film it. It has really crappy quality, but I'll ask him if I can send that video into my computer. It's better than nothing. And the good thing is that it sucks at catching light, so you can tell how strong the moon is. All you see is pitch black darkness, the street lamps, and the moon. The moon looks exactly like a sun, only that the sky is black.

I thought it was cool because I've never seen the moon emitting this strong light before. If I have I just don't remember. It's very rare that it's this strong right?

No not really as last might was a full moon and the reflection of the sun off of it can be really bright sometimes.

It lit up my back garden so much I could see a fox poking around near my chicken coop... which got me worried

Funny you should say this, because both the day before yesterday and yesterday, I noticed the moon being almost full and reflecting light very strongly. I guess there is nothing strange about it, but still, I havent noticed it being that bright before. I watched it for a few minutes. It just looked different in some way.


[edit on 27-9-2007 by Copernicus]

I had exactly the same thought last night, and having seen the amature Italian astronomas moon UFO clip i got my grandads old navy binoculas out and had a better look,

reminded me of a old outer limits episode where the sun goes supanova and inceases the moons brightness.

I stopped as it was so bright,and i got the fear my neighboughs thought i maybe perving on them.

I noticed the moons extraordinary brightness on Tuesday 9/25/07. Wednesday night it was so bright everything lit up like it glowed. Also I looked in the northern region of the sky and it looked like early morning glow the sky gets before the sun is beginning to come up.

It was weird seeing this and I agree it was brighter than I have ever seen it. I took some pictures of it Tuesday but my camera malfunctioned. Wednesday I again took pictures and it worked this time but nothing spectacular. I was amazed by the crisp brightness of moon light that I had to look with binoculars and squinted as I viewed the full moon.

It was beautiful.

It was Harvest Moon yesterday, which happens once every four years.


Source

I noticed it was extremely bright, too.

[edit on 27-9-2007 by Beachcoma]

It was exactly the same last year, and the year before and ......

Our ancestors recognised this phenomena - as per the link Beachcoma provided. Next month sees a similar effect with what is known as the Hunter's Moon: a period of exceptionally bright moonlight ideal for hunting by Mainly due to the height of the moon.

A natural phenomena that never ceases to impress

reply to post by ZikhaN


Hi there! This is perfectly normal for a full moon. It is really powerful and that moonlight makes everything look errie!

It is so bright that I can't stand to look at it through my telescope without using really high magnifications or a filter!

Oh and as someone mentioned- the Harvest moon is really good!

[edit on 27-9-2007 by timelike]

I would just like to remind everyone that the Moon never Emits light. Never, Ever. It only reflects light from the Sun.

The Chinese moon festival, the Harvest moon in the US, it is all about the best conditions for a very bright reflection. Cool clear atmosphere and optimal angles.

Originally posted by Essan
It was exactly the same last year, and the year before and ......

Oh yeah, my bad. The once every for years thing is the October Harvest Moon.

A lot of cultures around the world still celebrate the Harvest Moon. Here in Malaysia we just concluded the Chinese Moon Festival (which is also celebrated everywhere else there are Chinese people... which means everywhere anyway) so I was really enjoying them mooncakes. Yum! Oh wait, that means drink in Cantonese.. ok.. uhm.. Sek Yeh! (Eat stuff!)

Thx Beachcoma!! It's tonight too, I didn't know that^^ Maybe everyone should look at the moon right now?^^

Btw I just looked and it's not as strong anymore. And yesterday there were no clouds at all. It's still stronger light than usual, and it looks really freaky with the dark clouds^^

[edit on 27-9-2007 by ZikhaN]

reply to post by ZikhaN


Good job ZikhaN, I was outside waiting to take some snap shots of Genesis II (Satellite) just for an Astrophotography shot. I was going to catch it going by Ursa Major with the moon to my back.

Usually with a filter I can pick it up quite easy, but the freaking moon was pretty bright and had to make some last second adjustments. I remember thinking "It's usually not this bright, but I thought I was just crazy.

Good post by Beachcoma too, I never paid much attention to the Harvest Moon information before.

The moon was extremely awesome and obviously a few of us took note of the extrordinary sight.


It made me feel good to look at it's majesty!

This is a classic Harvest moon also on October 26th. The distance of the Moon from Earth on September 25th was 360,450 km (Perigee) as opposed to the maximum (Apogee) of 406,700 km (roughly). The Full Moon on Oct 26th will be at Perigee 356,750 km from Earth the Closest the Moon will be to the Earth this year.

reply to post by TheHorseChestnut


At perigee the tides would be quite massive, would it not?