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Once in a Blue Moon

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prue4567
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PostPosted: Fri Apr 20, 2007 5:36 pm


Once in a Blue Moon ... is a common way of saying not very often, but what exactly is a Blue Moon?

According to the popular definition, it is the second Full Moon to occur in a single calendar month.

The average interval between Full Moons is about 29.5 days, whilst the length of an average month is roughly 30.5 days. This makes it very unlikely that any given month will contain two Full Moons, though it does sometimes happen.

On average, there will be 41 months that have two Full Moons in every century, so you could say that once in a Blue Moon actually means once every two-and-a-half years.
How often does a year have two Blue Moons? Four or five times in a hundred years.
Double Blue Moons
In four or five years per century, there are two Blue Moons.

The first Blue Moon always occurs in January. The second occurs predominantly in March. In the 10,000 years starting with 1600, this is true in 343 out of 400 cases, or 86 per cent of the time. In 37 cases (or 9 per cent), the second Blue Moon is in April. In the remaining 20 cases (5 per cent) it is in May.

In order for a second Blue Moon to take place in March, there can be no Full Moon in February, and so non-leap years will inevitably be favoured. However, it is possible to have a double Blue Moon in a leap year. Clearly, the second Full Moon in January takes place near the very end of the 31st, and the first Full Moon in March is early on the 1st. The extremes of the lengths of the lunar month are 29 days 6 hours and 29 days 20 hours, so it is possible to skip February altogether in this way.

It is also possible for December and the following March both to have Blue Moons. This happened, for example, in December 1933 and March 1934. Since the practice of beginning the year on January 1st is just a convention (and quite a recent one), we can regard December/March pairs as double Blue Moons. When a December/March pair occurs, then February has no Full Moon, just as in January/March or January/April or January/May pairs.

There is a pattern to double Blue Moons. If you make a list of every year between 1600 and 9999 in which two Blue Moons occur, then take the year modulo 19 and assign a letter to it so that zero maps to A, 1 to B and so forth, up to S, then you find that there are sequences of successive double Blue Moon years which have the same letter. Eventually, another letter appears to herald the start of a new sequence. This is always 8 letters earlier in the sequence.

For example, the E sequence, which runs from 1771 to 2113, gives way to the P sequence which begins in 1915 and ends in 2485. The sequences almost always overlap in this way, but there are never more than two parallel sequences at any one time.

Each sequence runs for between 17 and 31 Metonic cycles, i.e. between 323 years and 589 years. A given sequence letter recurs after about 6700 years, but the sequence is not repeated exactly.
my source: once in a blue moon
PostPosted: Tue May 08, 2007 1:11 pm


When exactly are the blue moons, here are the ones i could find

Year Month First Full Moon Blue Moon
2007 June 1st at 01:02 30th at 13:48
2009 December 2nd at 07:29 31st at 19:11
2012 August 2nd at 03:25 31st at 13:56
2015 July 2nd at 02:19 31st at 10:41
2018 January 2nd at 02:23 31st at 13:27
2018 March 2nd at 00:50 31st at 12:35
2020 October 1st at 21:05 31st at 14:47
2023 August 1st at 18:29 31st at 01:35
2026 May 1st at 17:23 31st at 08:44
2028 December 2nd at 01:39 31st at 16:48
2031 September 1st at 09:20 30th at 18:56
2034 July 1st at 17:42 31st at 05:54
2037 January 2nd at 02:33 31st at 14:01
2037 March 2nd at 00:27 31st at 09:53
2039 October 2nd at 07:21 31st at 22:36
2042 August 1st at 17:32 31st at 01:59
2045 May 1st at 05:49 30th at 17:51
2048 January 1st at 06:54 31st at 00:13
2050 September 1st at 09:28 30th at 17:31
2053 July 1st at 01:59 30th at 17:03
2056 March 2nd at 00:37 31st at 10:22
2058 October 2nd at 01:35 31st at 12:51
2061 August 1st at 10:09 30th at 22:17
2064 May 1st at 02:07 30th at 10:34
2066 December 1st at 19:16 31st at 14:40
2067 March 1st at 04:39 30th at 20:07
2069 September 1st at 09:04 30th at 18:06
2072 May 2nd at 11:31 31st at 22:15
2075 April 1st at 08:44 30th at 18:35
2077 October 2nd at 01:19 31st at 10:36
2080 July 2nd at 04:08 31st at 19:12
2083 May 2nd at 02:27 31st at 09:41
2085 December 1st at 08:07 30th at 23:57
2088 September 1st at 02:57 30th at 15:25
2091 July 1st at 01:51 30th at 11:58
2094 January 1st at 16:51 31st at 12:35
2094 April 1st at 00:10 30th at 13:54
2096 October 2nd at 01:22 31st at 11:13
2099 August 1st at 02:59 30th at 17:55
2102 June 1st at 10:07 30th at 17:26
2104 December 2nd at 04:49 31st at 16:57
2107 October 2nd at 05:04 31st at 20:50
2110 July 2nd at 00:22 31st at 07:45
2113 January 2nd at 04:19 31st at 20:57
2113 May 1st at 01:11 30th at 16:10
2115 December 1st at 21:35 31st at 08:51
2118 August 1st at 17:18 31st at 04:33
2121 June 1st at 06:31 30th at 16:30
2124 January 1st at 16:10 31st at 03:09
2126 October 1st at 12:38 31st at 06:38
2129 July 2nd at 01:00 31st at 08:09
2132 March 2nd at 02:06 31st at 16:48
2134 December 1st at 16:35 31st at 06:54
2137 August 1st at 15:05 30th at 23:14
2140 May 2nd at 03:26 31st at 19:01
2143 January 1st at 16:29 31st at 03:26
2143 March 1st at 13:26 30th at 23:00
2145 September 1st at 09:24 30th at 22:15
2148 July 1st at 22:23 31st at 07:48
2151 April 1st at 08:15 30th at 19:56
2153 December 1st at 03:33 30th at 21:50
2156 August 1st at 15:46 30th at 23:16
2159 June 1st at 02:18 30th at 17:52
2162 January 1st at 12:42 31st at 02:18
2162 March 1st at 13:42 30th at 23:27
2164 September 1st at 06:20 30th at 15:42
2167 August 1st at 01:27 30th at 13:14
2170 April 1st at 06:38 30th at 15:30
2172 October 2nd at 02:39 31st at 17:19
2175 August 2nd at 14:00 31st at 23:21
2178 May 2nd at 01:16 31st at 12:45
2181 January 1st at 01:00 30th at 18:42
2181 March 1st at 09:56 30th at 22:28
2183 October 1st at 15:13 31st at 00:33
2186 July 1st at 19:41 31st at 11:12
2189 April 1st at 07:08 30th at 15:47
2191 November 1st at 09:23 30th at 22:43
2194 August 2nd at 04:58 31st at 18:10
2197 May 1st at 22:52 31st at 07:14
2200 January 1st at 08:16 31st at 03:38
2200 March 1st at 22:17 31st at 14:57
2202 November 1st at 01:00 30th at 10:44
2205 July 2nd at 05:10 31st at 18:41

prue4567
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prue4567
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PostPosted: Tue May 08, 2007 1:19 pm


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