Just when you thought things couldn’t get any weirder, a rare black moon is set to rise this weekend.
It’s expected in the early hours of Saturday morning, at around 2:06 a.m. EDT, according to the U.S. Naval Observatory. But you don’t need to wake up at 2 a.m. to catch it.
The black moon — which is not an official astronomical term — is different than many well-known moons of the year, such as the pink, harvest, or blood moons.
Unlike the other celestial spectacles, you can’t see this one.
The black moon is a special type of new moon. One of its eight phases, a new moon occurs when the celestial body passes between the Earth and the sun, making it invisible from our planet.
The black moon marks this invisible phase, with the illuminated side facing the sun and the dark side facing Earth.
There are two kinds of black moons: seasonal and monthly. This is a seasonal black moon, which happens once every 33 months or so. The other refers to when two new moons rise during a single month, with the second considered to be the black moon.
In February, the monthly version is even less frequent than the seasonal black moon, occurring when there is either no new moon, or no full one. That happens only every 19 years, according to Time and Date.
To make matters even more complicated, the term “black moon” is used to describe the third in a season of four new moons, according to Earthsky. But, that’s also known as a blue moon. So, it may be truthful to use the phrase “once in a black moon” now.
The phrase “once in a blue moon” dates back to 1528, according to MIT. A blue moon is also the second full moon in a calendar month.
So, what’s so special about the black moon if you can’t see it and it shares its dates with a blue moon?
First, the absence of lunar light will make stargazing even more dazzling. Often, light from the moon is bright enough to block out incoming meteor showers.
A new moon has even more effect on tides because the sun and Earth are in alignment. The moon’s gravitation pull is the primary force that drives ocean tides.
The next seasonal black moon is expected on August 20, 2028, and the next monthly black moon will happen on August 31, 2027.
If you want to see something similar to the black moon, try to catch a solar eclipse. The next total solar eclipse is slated for August 12, 2026, but you’ll need to buy plane tickets to Greenland, Iceland, Spain, Portugal, or Russia to see it.
