SuperMoon: Full Moon Is Up to 14% Larger, 30% Brighter Saturday Night, May 5, 2012

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The full Moon will be up to 14% larger and 30% brighter than others during the year. The reason for this phenomenon is that the Moon becomes full on its closest approach to Earth on Saturday May 5, 2012, also known as the perigee full Moon.

A “supermoon” is the coincidence of a full moon (or a new moon) with the closest approach the Moon makes to the Earth on its elliptical orbit, or perigee, leading to the technical name for a supermoon of the perigee-syzygy of the Earth-Moon-Sun system. The association of the Moon with both oceanic and crustal tides has led to claims that the supermoon phenomenon may be associated with increased risk of events such as earthquakes and volcanic eruptions. However, the evidence of such a link is widely held to be unconvincing.

Full Moons are traditionally associated with temporal insomnia, insanity (hence the terms lunacy and lunatic) and various “magical phenomena” such as lycanthropy. Psychologists, however, have found that there is no strong evidence for effects on human behavior around the time of a full moon.


Moonrise is about 7:48 to 7:50 p.m. — slightly south of east 114.9°
7:50 p.m. is 19:50, 20:00 is 8:00 p.m.

TIME       ALTITUDE   DEG E OF N   1 = FULL
19:50       -0.0       114.9       1.00
20:00        1.4       116.5       1.00
20:10        2.8       118.2       1.00
20:20        4.3       119.9       1.00
20:30        5.8       121.6       1.00
20:40        7.2       123.3       1.00
20:50        8.7       125.1       1.00
21:00       10.1       126.9       1.00
21:10       11.5       128.8       1.00
21:20       12.8       130.7       1.00
21:30       14.1       132.6       1.00
21:40       15.4       134.6       1.00
21:50       16.6       136.6       1.00
22:00       17.8       138.6       1.00

United States Naval Observatory
Sun or Moon Altitude/Azimuth Table


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