12:30 PM | "Blood moon" total eclipse early next week begins a series of total lunar eclipses

["Bloody red" moon during a total eclipse in December 2010]

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There will be a total eclipse of the moon early next week that will actually be the first in a series of four total lunar eclipses that will take place over the next 18 months. This first total lunar eclipse will be an early morning occurrence in the eastern U.S. with the first stages beginning around 2am early Tuesday morning (April 15th). The entire moon should be shaded by the Earth’s shadow about an hour later (3am) and this “full eclipse” stage will last until around 4:30am. The “partial” eclipse stage that follows will wind down around 5:30am.

The moon should take on a “blood red” appearance during this total eclipse which is a perfectly natural occurrence. Every time the moon passes completely into the shadow of the Earth, it turns a reddish color -- sometimes a bright copper, other times the dark reddish brown of dried blood. The “bloody” red color is caused by refraction of sunlight by the Earth’s atmosphere. It is the same effect that you see when the sun turns reddish-orange at sunset only in this case the refracted sunlight projects all the way to the moon.

It has been a long time since a total lunar eclipse has been visible from the United States - the last one took place on Dec. 11, 2011. But the good news is there are three more on the way after this one. This total lunar eclipse is the first in what is called a lunar tetrad -- four successive total lunar eclipses with no partial lunar eclipses in between, each of which is separated from the other by six full moons. The next total lunar eclipse, which also will be visible from nearly all of North America, will take place on October 8th of this year and then the following two will occur during April and September of 2015. Tetrads occur less often than a blue moon and are indeed somewhat rare. There will be only eight lunar tetrads in this century and the last one that occurred was back in 1967-1968.

This eclipse will also feature an additional astronomical anomaly as Mars will appear as a fiery red 'star' next to the moon. Mars actually makes its closest approach to the Earth since 2012 on Monday, April 14th. Together, red Mars and the red shadow on the moon's face should be a spectacular sight and an incredible photo opportunity.