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(CNN) — Get ready for an unusually beautiful moon to grace the night skies next week. There will be a total lunar eclipse Tuesday that will turn the moon a burnt reddish orange, NASA says.
It's called a blood moon, and this one is just the first in a series.
Within a year and a half, North America will be able to see a blood moon a total of four times. It gets its color during the eclipse from the shadow the Earth casts, which is the color of a desert sunset.
The four blood moons will occur in roughly six-month intervals on the following dates: April 15, 2014; October 8, 2014; April 4, 2015, and September 28, 2015.
With that frequency, one might be misled into thinking that they are commonplace.
There are about two lunar eclipses per year, NASA says. Some of them -- penumbral eclipses -- are so subtle, they are vaguely visible and go greatly unnoticed.
Other eclipses just cast a partial shadow on the moon but lend it none of that brilliant sunset hue.
Lunar eclipses -- penumbral, partial or umbral -- occur in random order, NASA says. Getting four umbral eclipses in a row is rare.
Astronomers have a name for that lucky draw. It's called a tetrad, NASA says.
- April 15, 2014
- October 8, 2014
- April 4, 2015
- September 28, 2015
In the 21st century, there will be many such tetrads, but look back a few centuries, and you'll find the opposite phenomenon, says NASA's Fred Espenak, who studies eclipses.
Before the dawn of the 20th century, there was a 300-year period when there were none, he said. Zero.
That would mean that neither Sir Isaac Newton, Mozart, Queen Anne, George Washington, Napoleon, Abraham Lincoln nor their contemporaries ever had a chance to see one.
So, we're in luck. To take advantage of it, you'll have to stay up late from Monday night into Tuesday.
For gazing geeks, NASA has set up a live web chat to answer questions about the eclipse starting at 1 a.m. Eastern Time.
The heavenly curtain rises on Tuesday's lunar review around 2 a.m. ET, when the moon starts to slide into Earth's shadow.
It should turn into a blood moon -- a coppery red -- about an hour later and stay that way for over an hour, NASA says.
The blood moon comes right on time for the Jewish festival of Passover, which commemorates the survival of the ancient Israelites, who the Bible says were spared death when they painted lamb's blood on their doorways.
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