Mars, Before the 'Blood Moon' Lunar Eclipse Tonight, is at its Closest to Earth Since 2008

On early Tuesday morning/Monday night at around 1 a.m. EST, a total lunar eclipse is scheduled to take place that will be visible for much of the United States. Mars is expected to make its closest approach to the Earth in six years prior to the eclipse.

The "Blood Moon" eclipse will be the first visible total eclipse of the moon seen from North America since 2010. The moon will appear to be red when the sunlight shines through the Earth's atmosphere and hits the moon. The Earth will move in between the moon and the sun while Mars comes within 57.4 million miles.

Mars takes 687 days to orbit the sun, which brings it into opposition with the Earth approximately every two years and seven weeks, with some oppositions being better than others.

The year 2003 featured the most notable Mars approach when it came within 34.6 million miles of Earth, but the Earth-Mars orbital geometry was not good enough to get favorable views of the Red Planet. During tonight's eclipse, you can view Mars and details of its surface through a 6-inch telescope with an eyepiece magnifying 118-power, Fox News reports.

Tonight's eclipse will be the first one of the year and will be visible for many in the Western Hemisphere. The eclipse occurs in seven phases, with the "Total Eclipse" and "Greatest Eclipse" phases lasting 78 minutes. The lunar event begins with the "penumbral eclipse" (lasting five hours and 47 minutes) followed by the partial eclipse (lasting three hours and 35 minutes), with the total and greatest eclipses in between. The event begins at 4:53:37 Universal Time (UT) and ends at 10:37:37 UT.

During the greatest eclipse, which is the most revealing phase of the event, the Moon will lie at the zenith for a point on the South Pacific about 3,000 km southwest of the Galapagos Islands, occurring at 7:45:40 UT.

For those interested in viewing the event, it will be visible for all of North and South America. The western Pacific region will miss the first half of the eclipse, and north and east Europe, eastern Africa, the Middle East, and Central Asia will be unable to view any part of it.

You can read more about the total lunar eclipse and where/when it can be viewed in this Guardian news article as well as this NPR blog.