Blood moon -- the sequel: Coming to a sky near you

NEW: The full eclipse has ended
This blood moon is the size of a super moon, more than 5% larger than the last blood moon
It is the second in a series of four -- called a tetrad
Tetrads can be rare; for a 300-year stretch, there were none




We want to see your shots of the blood moon! Share your best photos with iReport, and you could be featured on CNN.
(CNN) -- Sequels are usually a disappointment. But not this time, not with this heavenly body.
People throughout the United States had a frt-row seat for the show: a lunar eclipse that made the moon look a burnt reddish-orange.
The"blood moon," as it's called, was the second of the year.

#BloodMoon #TotalLunarEclipse. Beautiful. From @NASA. http://t.co/nY3h4w9vUS pic.twitter.com/Q499iZWiZu— Josh Levs (@JoshLevs) October 8, 2014


The full eclipse started at about 6:25 a.m. ET and lasted until about 7:24 a.m. ET.

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See lunar eclipse turn into blood moon


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'Blood moon' : Why is it red?


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Lunar eclipse in a minute

Because it happened right after the perigee -- when the moon is closest in its orbit to Earth -- this blood moon was nearly the size of a super moon, appearing more than 5% larger than the previous blood moon in April.
While we're talking sequels, this series is only halfway through. Two more blood moons are coming. Hollywood might dub it a quadrilogy, but scientists call it a tetrad.
The series is occurring in roughly six-month intervals. April 4, 2015, is the next one, and last will appear on September 28, 2015.
NASA will guide the curious through the eclipse in a live chat on its website.
A rare treat
With that frequency, you could be misled into thinking blood moons are fairly common.
In the 21st century, there will be many tetrads, but look back a few centuries, and you'll find the opposite phenomenon, NASA says.
Before the dawn of the 20th century, there was a 300-year period when there were none, says NASA eclipse expert Fred Espenak.
That would mean that Sir Isaac Newton, Mozart, Queen Anne, George Washington, Napoleon, Abraham Lincoln and their contemporaries never had a chance to see such a sequence.

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A "blood moon" rises over the El Salvador del Mundo monument in San Salvador early Tuesday, April 15, as a total lunar eclipse attracts sky gazers across the Americas. In a total lunar eclipse, the full moon turns a coppery red as it passes into Earth's shadow. "It's like seeing all the sunsets on Earth projected on the moon at once," says Indra Petersons of CNN's "New Day."
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The moon is seen from Miami before the beginning of the total lunar eclipse. The blood moon was most prominent in North and South America.
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Another shot from Miami. Showers and clouds rendered viewing the blood moon a bust in some U.S. cities.
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Dust and sulfur dioxide in the Earth's atmosphere can affect the size of the shadow spreading across the moon's surface.
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The moon has to be full for the total lunar eclipse to occur.
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The Earth's shadow crosses over the last bit of reflected light on the moon's surface.
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The moon begins to take on a reddish hue early Tuesday from Miami. The moon did so as it appeared in different phases between 2 and 4:30 a.m. ET.
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The red hue is caused by refracted sunlight in the Earth's atmosphere, which bounces off the moon while in shadow. The entire reddening process takes about an hour.
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The total lunar eclipse is seen in this image taken from Miami. Unlike solar eclipses, lunar eclipses are safe to view with the naked eye and don't require special filters.
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A lunar eclipse takes place over Southern California early Tuesday as seen from the San Gabriel Valley. North America will see a blood moon four times -- known as a tetrad -- between now and September 2015.
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There are about two lunar eclipses per year, NASA says.
Some are so subtle they're barely visible and pretty much go unnoticed.
Other eclipses cast a partial shadow on the moon but don't give it that blood moon color that only total eclipses do. They come around, on average, less than once a year.
Here's your blood moon playlist
A global sunset shining on the moon
The brilliant hues of a blood moon come from the edges of the sun peeking around the periphery of the Earth, catching the atmosphere. It's essentially a global sunset shining on the moon, which has to be in just the right position to catch those rays.
Lunar eclipses -- whatever the variety -- occur in random order, NASA says. Getting four total eclipses in a row, especially blood moons, is like drawing a rare lunar poker hand of four of a kind.
"The most unique thing about the 2014-2015 tetrad is that all of them are visible for all or parts of the U.S.A.," said Espenak.
The people of Europe, Africa and the Middle East were not be able to see this blood moon.
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