The reflected sunlight of the moon will blink on and off during a lunar eclipse just visible by an asteroid-bound spacecraft.
Lucy, a NASA craft, is going to visit clusters of asteroids that are the same distance from the sun as Jupiter, in order to view the Super Flower Blood Mmoon lunar eclipse on May 15. The mission is on a path back to Earth for a gravity assist to the outer solar system in October, but it is far away. You can watch the Flower Blood Moon eclipse on the internet. The sun rises at 0130 GMT.
According to officials with the Southwest Research Institute in Colorado, some of the high-definition cameras on the spacecraft should be able to see the moon passing into the Earth's shadow in the lunar eclipse on May 15 and 16.
Lucy will view the eclipse from an angle that is rarely seen. The moon will not be visible until it leaves the shadow of the Earth.
There will be a total lunar eclipse in May 2022.
Lucy will use its high resolution panchromatic camera to see the eclipse. That instrument is based on a version that flew on the New Horizons craft that flew by the dwarf planet.
The press release implied that other imagers may be involved. Lucy has other instruments. There is a two in one instrument with a color camera and aLinear etalon imager.
During Lucy's main mission, the Terminal Tracking Cameras (T2CAM) will provide wide-field imagery and the L'TES will measure the surface temperature of target asteroids.
The Lucy team will be able to do a test run of the observation procedures when they view this eclipse.
The total eclipse of the Flower Moon will be visible in parts of the Americas, Africa, Europe, and the east Pacific. A penumbral eclipse can be seen in New Zealand, eastern Europe and the Middle East.
TimeandDate.com says the partial eclipse phase of the moon eclipse begins at 10:28 pm on May 15. On May 16th, it starts at 0228GMT. The Blood Moon peak is May 16 at 12:11 a.m. The sun rises at 0411 GMT. The event ends at 1:45 a.m. The sun rises at 0555 GMT. The penumbral eclipse will start an hour earlier and end an hour after the partial eclipse.
If you want to photograph the moon, or want to prepare your gear for the total lunar eclipse, check out our best cameras. You can read our guides on how to photograph a lunar eclipse and how to photograph the moon with a camera.
If you snap an amazing lunar eclipse photo and would like to share it with Space.com's readers, send your photo, comments, and your name and location to us.
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