Stargazers will be treated to a trio of successive celestial events in 2019. The biggest and brightest full moon of 2019 lit up the skies last night. This Super Snow Moon was just one of three Supermoons to lift the late-night gloom this year.
The first Supermoon fell on January 21 and the last one will fall on Thursday, March 21.
Early birds and night owls all over Europe witnessed the moon.
The Supermoon was at its brightest at 3.53pm GMT yesterday.
And the Supermoon rose into our skies at 5.20pm in the UK.
However stargazers were warned they would have to wait a two more hours before they could catch a glimpse of the Supermoon.
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The Full Moon Supermoon will arrive less than 4 hours after the arrival of the March 20th equinox.
It makes this astronomical event the closest coincidence of the March equinox and full moon since March 20, 2000.
And the next time this happens will be 11 years from now, in 2030.
For the Northern Hemisphere, tonight’s full moon ushers in the first Full Moon of the spring season.
And the March Full Moon is the third and final Full Moon Supermoon of the year.
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Generally, the first Full Moon of a Northern Hemisphere spring precedes the imminent arrival of Easter.
Easter Sunday usually lands on the first Sunday after the first Full Moon in spring, leading some to expect Easter Sunday to take place on March 24.
However, by ecclesiastical rules, the equinox is actually fixed on March 21, so that places this year’s Easter Sunday on April 21.
The last time that an ecclesiastical and an astronomical Easter didn’t occur on the same date was 38 years ago, in 1981.
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Why is the March Full Moon called the Worm Moon?
A Worm Moon is simply a term for a Full Moon that lands in March.
The term Worm Moon is assigned to March because this is the time of year when more worms begin slithering out of the thawing ground.
The second full moon in a calendar month is sometimes called a blue moon, so the one on March 31 could be considered a Blue Worm Moon.
But it is technically no different from any other Full Moon of the year.
Some people call March’s full moons Sap Moons, while others refer to them as Crow Moons.
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