The moon is always at its fullest on the 15th of the Lunar Jewish month, a.k.a. the syzygy — the lining up of celestial bodies, particularly the sun, Earth and moon. But this time, on the 15th of Heshvan, a.k.a. Monday night, November 14, we’re going to have a Supermoon, which occurs when the 15th of the Jewish month falls on the closest approach the Moon makes to the Earth on its elliptical orbit, resulting in the largest apparent size of the lunar disk as seen from Earth.
The Moon’s distance varies each month between approximately 222,000 and 252,000 miles, due to its elliptical orbit around the Earth. A full moon at perigee (nearest to the earth) is visually larger up to 30% in area and shines 30% more light than at apogee (its farthest point).
When the syzygy and the perigee coincide, you get a super moon. Astrologer Richard Noelle claims he coined the term in 1979, in an article for Horoscope magazine which described “a new or full moon which occurs with the Moon at or near (within 90 per cent of) its closest approach to Earth in a given orbit.”
Monday’s Supermoon will be the closest Supermoon since January 26, 1948. It will become full about two hours before perigee, when the moon will be roughly 221,525 miles from Earth. Now, that’s up close!
There’s a dark aspect to this story: the media are speculating that natural disasters, such as the 2011 Tōhoku earthquake and tsunami and the 2004 Indian Ocean earthquake and tsunami, have been causally linked with the week period surrounding a super moon. Of course, no hard evidence exists to support the notion of a correlation between super moons and major earthquakes. So it’s safe to go outside and take a look.