How to watch lunar eclipse in Australia tonight

Tonight’s lunar eclipse will be visible all around the world – including Australia. Here’s when and where you can get the best view.

Grace Baldwin

@disgracebaldwin

less than 2 min read

March 25, 2024 - 12:34PM

NCA NewsWire

There will be a penumbral lunar eclipse tonight. Picture: NCA NewsWire / Gary Ramage

Stargazers will be able to delight in a lunar eclipse on Monday night, visible from all around the world.

A penumbral lunar eclipse will grace the Australian sky tonight as, for a period, the moon will be almost perfectly aligned with the sun and Earth.

This causes the more diffuse outer edge of the Earth’s shadow – the penumbra – to fall onto the moon’s face and create a subtle eclipse.

The eclipse will be more subtle than many other eclipses. Picture: NCA NewsWire / Dan Peled

Known as one of the more elusive types of solar eclipse, the penumbral eclipse is hard to see because there is never a dark slice taken out of the moon.

The eclipse usually looks like a dark shading on the moon, but some may not notice anything.

Director of the Abrams Planetarium at Michigan State University in the US, Dr Shannon Schmoll, confirmed the eclipse would be subtle.

It may be hard to see as the eclipse is very subtle. Picture: iStock

“It’ll be almost a gradient of darkening happening from one side of the moon to the other. It’s not going to be a super dramatic change in what we see in the moon,” Dr Schmoll said to 9News.

“But if you’re sitting there watching it, you might notice some slight variations in brightness.”

The eclipse will be visible on the night side of the earth including Europe, North and East Asia, Australia, Africa, North America and South America.