Blue Moon New Year’s Eve | How Often Does THAT Happen?

No, the New Year’s Eve moon won’t look blue

Image from Flickr.

New Year’s Eve is always a special day, but this year it is extra special. We’ve all heard the phrase “once in a blue moon,” and that “once” is happening on New Year’s Eve. A blue moon is when there are two full moons in one month, and it just so happens that not only will there me a full moon on New Year’s Eve, it will be the second one to occur in December 2009.

Brand X reports that a blue moon happens “just seven times every 19 years.” Huh? What kind of a screwed up statistic is that? That’s about once every 2.7 years. So next time someone says “once in a blue moon” to you, you’ll know what you’re dealing with. It’s about as often as people with jobs get denied no credit check payday loans.

Special keeps getting specialer

Just to make things more interesting, there will also be a partial lunar eclipse on New Year’s Eve. We won’t be able to see it from North America, but people in Asia, Africa and Europe will. A blue moon lunar eclipse is, of course, even less common than a blue moon, and it happens once every 15 to 20 years.

The Associated Press reports that a blue moon New Year’s Eve occurs only once every 19 years. Regarding a blue moon, lunar eclipse and New Year’s Eve ocurring at the same time, the web site Des Pardes says “Such a coincidence has not been witnessed on the planet in the present and previous centuries.”

Whoa. So does that mean this is the most special New Year’s Eve ever?

Be safe

In other super weird news, The Associated Press says a funeral home in Rome, Georgia, is offering free burials to anyone who signs a contract saying he or she will drink or take drugs and drive on New Year’s Eve.

Funeral home officials said the program is designed to save lives by making partygoers think twice about drinking and driving.

Well, it’s a strange way to do it, but reminding people that drinking and driving can have deadly consequences is important.