February 1943 lunar eclipse

February 1943 lunar eclipse
Partial eclipse
	The Moon's hourly motion shown right to left
Date	February 20, 1943
Gamma	0.5752
Magnitude	0.7616
Saros cycle	132 (26 of 71)
Partiality	189 minutes, 1 second
Penumbral	345 minutes, 8 seconds
P1
Contacts (UTC)
P1	2:45:21
U1	4:03:28
Greatest	5:37:57
U4	7:12:29
P4	8:30:29
	← August 1942 August 1943 →

A partial lunar eclipse occurred at the Moon’s ascending node of orbit on Saturday, February 20, 1943,^[1] with an umbral magnitude of 0.7616. A lunar eclipse occurs when the Moon moves into the Earth's shadow, causing the Moon to be darkened. A partial lunar eclipse occurs when one part of the Moon is in the Earth's umbra, while the other part is in the Earth's penumbra. Unlike a solar eclipse, which can only be viewed from a relatively small area of the world, a lunar eclipse may be viewed from anywhere on the night side of Earth. Occurring about 3.8 days after apogee (on February 16, 1943, at 9:00 UTC), the Moon's apparent diameter was smaller.^[2]

Visibility

The eclipse was completely visible over North and South America, seen rising over northeast Asia and the central Pacific Ocean and setting over Africa, Europe, and the Middle East.^[3]

Eclipse details

Shown below is a table displaying details about this particular solar eclipse. It describes various parameters pertaining to this eclipse.^[4]

February 20, 1943 Lunar Eclipse Parameters
Parameter	Value
Penumbral Magnitude	1.84442
Umbral Magnitude	0.76156
Gamma	0.57517
Sun Right Ascension	22h11m04.8s
Sun Declination	-11°13'23.9"
Sun Semi-Diameter	16'10.5"
Sun Equatorial Horizontal Parallax	08.9"
Moon Right Ascension	10h11m38.1s
Moon Declination	+11°43'51.2"
Moon Semi-Diameter	14'56.3"
Moon Equatorial Horizontal Parallax	0°54'49.3"
ΔT	25.9 s

Eclipse season

This eclipse is part of an eclipse season, a period, roughly every six months, when eclipses occur. Only two (or occasionally three) eclipse seasons occur each year, and each season lasts about 35 days and repeats just short of six months (173 days) later; thus two full eclipse seasons always occur each year. Either two or three eclipses happen each eclipse season. In the sequence below, each eclipse is separated by a fortnight.

Eclipse season of February 1943
February 4 Descending node (new moon)	February 20 Ascending node (full moon)

Total solar eclipse Solar Saros 120	Partial lunar eclipse Lunar Saros 132

Related eclipses

Lunar eclipses of 1940–1944

This eclipse is a member of a semester series. An eclipse in a semester series of lunar eclipses repeats approximately every 177 days and 4 hours (a semester) at alternating nodes of the Moon's orbit.^[5]

The penumbral lunar eclipses on April 22, 1940 and October 16, 1940 occur in the previous lunar year eclipse set, and the penumbral lunar eclipses on July 6, 1944 and December 29, 1944 occur in the next lunar year eclipse set.

Lunar eclipse series sets from 1940 to 1944
Ascending node				Descending node
Saros	Date Viewing	Type Chart	Gamma	Saros	Date Viewing	Type Chart	Gamma
102	1940 Mar 23	Penumbral	−1.5034	107
112	1941 Mar 13	Partial	−0.8437	117	1941 Sep 05	Partial	0.9747
122	1942 Mar 03	Total	−0.1545	127	1942 Aug 26	Total	0.1818
132	1943 Feb 20	Partial	0.5752	137	1943 Aug 15	Partial	−0.5534
142	1944 Feb 09	Penumbral	1.2698	147	1944 Aug 04	Penumbral	−1.2843

Saros 132

This eclipse is a part of Saros series 132, repeating every 18 years, 11 days, and containing 71 events. The series started with a penumbral lunar eclipse on May 12, 1492. It contains partial eclipses from August 16, 1636 through March 24, 1997; total eclipses from April 4, 2015 through August 2, 2213; and a second set of partial eclipses from August 13, 2231 through November 30, 2411. The series ends at member 71 as a penumbral eclipse on June 26, 2754.

The longest duration of totality will be produced by member 36 at 106 minutes, 6 seconds on June 9, 2123. All eclipses in this series occur at the Moon’s ascending node of orbit.^[6]

Greatest	First
The greatest eclipse of the series will occur on 2123 Jun 09, lasting 106 minutes, 6 seconds.^[7]	Penumbral	Partial	Total	Central
	1492 May 12	1636 Aug 16	2015 Apr 04	2069 May 06
	Last
	Central	Total	Partial	Penumbral
	2177 Jul 11	2213 Aug 02	2411 Nov 30	2754 Jun 26

Eclipses are tabulated in three columns; every third eclipse in the same column is one exeligmos apart, so they all cast shadows over approximately the same parts of the Earth.

Series members 19–40 occur between 1801 and 2200:
19	20	21
1816 Dec 04	1834 Dec 16	1852 Dec 26

22	23	24
1871 Jan 06	1889 Jan 17	1907 Jan 29

25	26	27
1925 Feb 08	1943 Feb 20	1961 Mar 02

28	29	30
1979 Mar 13	1997 Mar 24	2015 Apr 04

31	32	33
2033 Apr 14	2051 Apr 26	2069 May 06

34	35	36
2087 May 17	2105 May 28	2123 Jun 09

37	38	39
2141 Jun 19	2159 Jun 30	2177 Jul 11

40
2195 Jul 22

Tritos series

This eclipse is a part of a tritos cycle, repeating at alternating nodes every 135 synodic months (≈ 3986.63 days, or 11 years minus 1 month). Their appearance and longitude are irregular due to a lack of synchronization with the anomalistic month (period of perigee), but groupings of 3 tritos cycles (≈ 33 years minus 3 months) come close (≈ 434.044 anomalistic months), so eclipses are similar in these groupings.

Series members between 1801 and 2200
1801 Mar 30 (Saros 119)	1812 Feb 27 (Saros 120)	1823 Jan 26 (Saros 121)	1833 Dec 26 (Saros 122)	1844 Nov 24 (Saros 123)

1855 Oct 25 (Saros 124)	1866 Sep 24 (Saros 125)	1877 Aug 23 (Saros 126)	1888 Jul 23 (Saros 127)	1899 Jun 23 (Saros 128)

1910 May 24 (Saros 129)	1921 Apr 22 (Saros 130)	1932 Mar 22 (Saros 131)	1943 Feb 20 (Saros 132)	1954 Jan 19 (Saros 133)

1964 Dec 19 (Saros 134)	1975 Nov 18 (Saros 135)	1986 Oct 17 (Saros 136)	1997 Sep 16 (Saros 137)	2008 Aug 16 (Saros 138)

2019 Jul 16 (Saros 139)	2030 Jun 15 (Saros 140)	2041 May 16 (Saros 141)	2052 Apr 14 (Saros 142)	2063 Mar 14 (Saros 143)

2074 Feb 11 (Saros 144)	2085 Jan 10 (Saros 145)	2095 Dec 11 (Saros 146)	2106 Nov 11 (Saros 147)	2117 Oct 10 (Saros 148)

2128 Sep 09 (Saros 149)	2139 Aug 10 (Saros 150)	2150 Jul 09 (Saros 151)	2161 Jun 08 (Saros 152)	2172 May 08 (Saros 153)

	2194 Mar 07 (Saros 155)

Half-Saros cycle

A lunar eclipse will be preceded and followed by solar eclipses by 9 years and 5.5 days (a half saros).^[8] This lunar eclipse is related to two total solar eclipses of Solar Saros 139.