In the wee hours of the morning on September 28th , the Halloween season was officially kicked off by the appearance of the very rare Super Blood Moon. Despite the haunting title there were no vampire attacks, werewolf bites, or wicked witch séances (try to say that 10 times fast) that took place beneath its frightening red glow…that we are aware of!! I might have seen a zombie or two passing by, but that may have been a college student pulling an all-nighter. What you most likely saw was people squinting, iPhones pointed to the sky, trying to get a quick photo when the moon peeked out behind the clouds. Probably not as cool as the vampire thing but less likely to keep you awake at night.
Being a Halloween baby myself I couldn’t pass up a chance to watch this spooky event take place…and maybe get a few shots to add to my Instagram feed. This special moon will not make another appearance until October 2033 and there is a possibility that by then I would just be too tired from my underpaid desk job to stay up to watch. Also, by then NASA will have people on Mars and that will probably seem more interesting.
I brought my “fancy” camera to attempt to get a few good shots—or at least a few that didn’t just look like a blurry light in the sky, which I knew from experience would happen if I tried to take a picture with my phone. Honestly though, the “getting” of the pictures was harder than I expected. Lying in the grass with my camera I stared at the sky for what seemed like forever until the moon rusted and turned to a blood red! Secretly I was still waiting for all the ghost and ghouls to make an appearance…a girl can hope can’t she?! I sat outside for four hours fighting the clouds to get a good image.
But it was completely worth it. I didn’t have a tripod or a monopod so I propped my camera on my makeshift towel pillow and held my breath just praying it wouldn’t be blurry. I might have been a little oxygen deprived but other than that I was successful! I got some pictures of both the red moon and after when it returned to a ghostly white. For those of you who forgot or honestly just don’t care about the Super blood moon because “I have class in 3 hours”, I think you’ll enjoy these photos.
After seeing the rare and mysterious blood moon, the only thing that would make this Halloween even better would be NASA announcing an alien sighting on Mars!! After their recent, and often suspected, discovery of water on Mars I would not be surprised to learn that there were aliens taking a dip! Trick-or-Treat yourself to researching that most interesting topic next!! (See what I did there ;P)
All images taken by Cali Willcockson
