Rare super blue moon with ringed planet Saturn to appear tonight

An extraordinary combination of a supermoon and a blue moon will be visible tonight (Aug 30) in the sky, Chairman of the Arthur C. Clarke Institute for Modern Technologies Prof. Chandana Jayaratne said.

Meanwhile, as the full moon occurs when the moon is at its closest to the Earth in its orbit, the moon will be 14% bigger and 30% brighter than some of the other usually occurring full moons, according to the professor.

“When a full moon takes place while the moon is near its closest approach to Earth, it is called a Super Full Moon or a Supermoon. On 2023 August 31st at 7.05 a.m., the moon will be closest to the Earth with a distance of 357,344 km from the Earth”, he said.

Furthermore, Prof. Jayaratne pointed out that the moon would not get any closer to the Earth until November 2025.

“Size and brightness of the full moons on Poya days vary slightly from month to month because of the non-circular but elliptical shape of the moon’s orbit around the earth with the closest distance of the moon to the earth (“perigee”) being about 50,000 km closer than the furthest distance (“apogee”)”, the professor emphasized.

Commenting further regarding the matter, Prof. Jayaratne, Head of the Physics Department of University of Colombo said: “When two full moons fall on the same month, the second full moon is called the blue moon. This is just a name and the moon actually does not appear in blue colour.

“Though you can see the full moon from the 30th dusk after the sunset in the eastern skies, the best time to observe this super blue moon is August 31 predawn period before sunrise, on the western skies to see the big moon with ringed bright Saturn, which is at opposition these days, closer to the moon.

“If you miss this opportunity, you’ll have to wait until January and March 2037 for the next super blue moons.

“There will be somewhat high tide on this day due to the closeness of the moon but no earthquakes or other natural disasters have been reported in the past on similar occasions, though there are rumours spreading about the onset of natural disasters like earthquakes, tsunamis, cyclones.”