Archive for April, 2026

March 3 2026 Lunar Eclipse

April 10, 2026

In honour of Artemis II that, as I write this, is less than 12 hours away from Earth re-entry on Day 10 of an amazing return to Luna including being witness to a total solar (vs lunar) eclipse while rounding the far side of the Moon.

Some of my total lunar eclipse pics from Tue Mar 3, mostly with Seestar S50.

Time lapse coming out of totality. Over about 20 mins of real time compressed into 2 seconds.

Images below:

  1. Mid totality around 22:42 AEDT.
  2. More than 15 mins post totality.
  3. Almost 45 mins post totality. Played around with exposure and gain to get a balance of features.
  4. 55 mins post totality. More feature enhancing (see comment on last pic).
  5. 50 mins post totality messing around with exposure and gain to emphasise subtle lunar features. You can still see umbral fringing.
  6. Fun 3 sec handheld iPhone shot through one lens of tripod mounted 15×70 binoculars. You can see movement in the star at upper right and in the blurry Luna. The colour is pleasing though.
  7. iPhone shot near end of totality to left of our walnut tree. S50 shots were all taken behind the tree given the low elevation of Luna during the eclipse.

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Artemis II

April 3, 2026

Artemis I (NHQ202211080010)
Artemis I (NHQ202211080010) by NASA HQ PHOTO is licensed under CC-BY-NC-ND 2.0

I have been just a little bit excited about Artemis II, that launched just before 9am on Thursday morning, Adelaide time. It’s been a long time since the Apollo program ended (1972).

I still have an enduring memory of (5 year old me) watching the grainy Apollo 11 landing on our B&W TV after getting to school and being told to go home and watch it in 1969.

Watching the launch on NASA TV (YouTube) and ABC News yesterday morning with Karen was wonderful and scary at the same time, especially waiting for the passage through maximum dynamic pressure (MaxQ), solid rocket booster (SRB) separation, and main engine cutoff (MECO).

Despite a few minor problems leading up to and after launch (e.g. a launch abort system battery sensor issue on the pad, fixing the loo and a potable water system valve in orbit), it was about as flawless as it gets.

Then today, we saw a calm lead up to Trans-Lunar Injection (TLI) that sent Reid Wiseman, Victor Glover, Christina Koch, and Jeremy Hansen on their way around the Moon, further than any human has been, on a free return trajectory back to Earth on day 10, similar to the one taken by Apollo 13.

The crew will get to see a solar eclipse on day 6 when the Orion spacecraft is behind the Moon.

That humanity is going back more than half a century after Apollo is the main thing, with another test flight followed by a landing in 2028. I hope it becomes as much about exploration as anything, but I realise that there are also military and commercial interests.

Here are a few useful links for the Artemis II mission:

Enjoy.

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