Community Corner

Blue Moon to Give Neil Armstrong Final Wink

Neil Armstrong, the first man to walk on the moon, will be buried Aug. 31. That's the same day as a rare, blue moon.

The next rare `blue moon' is scheduled for Friday, Aug. 31, 2012, the same day that a private service will be held for a Neil Armstrong, the first man to walk on the moon. Some say it's a fitting cosmic send off for a man whose destiny was so entwined with the moon.

Armstrong died Aug. 25, 2012, at the age of 82.

According to Fox News, a blue moon occurs when there's a second full moon in one calendar month. A blue moon won't come around again until 2015. The full moon cycle is 29.5 days, so a blue moon is rare, but it doesn't mean that the moon will actually glow blue.

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Phys.org reports that two full moons in the same month occur once every 2.5 years or so. Astrophysicist Dr Stephen Hughes said that Blue Moons occur only about seven times in 19 years—about once every two-and-a-half years.

"A bit like the leap year, a blue moon happens as a calendar catch-up because it takes the moon about 27 and a half days to go round the earth," Hughes reports. "And since this is less than the number of days in a calendar month, two full moons can sometimes occur in a single month."

Find out what's happening in Lilburn-Mountain Parkwith free, real-time updates from Patch.

Friday there will be a second full moon this month.

When announcing his death on Aug. 25, Armstrong's family asked that people pay tribute to him by looking at the moon and giving the famous astronaut a wink. On Friday, there will be the opportunity to do so under a rare, blue moon.


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