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Moon Declination During Lunar Eclipse in May 2022

-- Jeff | May 16, 2022
North Pole of the Moon

Question:

During the lunar eclipse on May 15th and 16th, I noticed the moons declination was around – 14.
Being new to astronomy basics, I am curious how I, living in South Carolina, could see the eclipse so high in the sky. It is my understanding that negative declination numbers would be south of the celestial equater ?

-- Jeff

Answer:

I believe that the Moon’s declination at the time of the umbral phase of the lunar eclipse on May 16 2022 was closer to -19 degrees.  This still places the actual position of the Moon at about 15 degrees elevation from your location.  As right ascension and declination are projections of the Earth’s longitude and latitude on the sky, and the Earth’s axis tilted relative to its orbital plane by about 23.5 degrees, we can see celestial locations which are at negative declination.  One can calculate the transit elevation of an object from a given observer latitude given the object’s declination as follows: Elevation = 90 – Latitude + Declination.  For the Moon on May 16, the transit elevation would have been about 38 degrees from your latitude.

-- Jeff Mangum