Moon Phases
Saturday, March 07, 2026
Waning Gibbous 86% illuminated
Rise: 10:41 PM
Set: 7:39 AM
Eye on the Night Sky, March 7, 2026
Saturday, March 07, 2026
Today:
Viewing is tricky, requiring a flat horizon, and probably binoculars, but this evening Venus and Saturn are very close together, very low in the west, and just after sunset, between roughly 6:30 and 6:50 PM. The much brighten Venus will be easier to spot, with Saturn barely above and to the left. Tomorrow evening, you’ll see the effects of Venus’s orbit, shifting to slightly higher than Saturn.
Sunday:
Daylight Savings Time begins today, as we move the clocks ahead one hour, making the sunrise and sunset an hour later. There is actually a connection to astronomy, as time used to be “local”, based on the Sun’s position being due south at noon. That changed in the 1800s, when trains needed a “standard” time system.
Monday:
By 2:30 AM tomorrow, a waning Gibbous Moon climbs into the southeast, and will spend the night seemingly towing a red star just behind it. This is Antares, the “heart” of the Scorpion. The pair slides low through the southern skies, cresting due south at 6:10 AM, only a quarter of the way above the horizon, as they fading into the morning twilight.
Start Chart:
Total Lunar Eclipse
The Moon passes into the Earth’s shadow early Tuesday morning, March 3rd, 2026.
The Moon moves into the Earth’s shadow late at night on Tuesday, March 3rd, just as twilight increases. By the time the Moon is fully eclipsed, it becomes difficult to see in the brightening twilight, and it sets only 20 minutes after the eclipse is total.
The Earth’s rotation causes the stars, as well as the Moon, to rise in the east and set in the west. The Moon’s orbital motion, however, goes the opposite way, with the Moon actually moving from west to east, but much, much more slowly. This means the Moon’s expected motion, lowering toward the western horizon, comes from the Earth’s rotation. The Moon’s actual orbital motion causes it to move into the Earth’s shadow from lower right to upper left. This explains why the shadow starts on the Moon’s upper left, and progresses to the lower right.
Lunar eclipses aren’t rare, but they are also not frequent. The next Total Lunar Eclipse visible here is in June 2029, followed by another in December of 2029.
This program is a partnership between the Fairbanks Museum and Vermont Public.