Super Blood Moon to wow us all, possibly launch apocalypse

Are you ready for the Super Blood Moon that’s scheduled to appear in the sky on Sunday night? It’s going to be the super-est, bloodiest moon in HISTORY.

That is, if it doesn’t kill us all.

Let’s back up a second. Like the Avengers movies being more interesting than the 75th solo Iron Man outing, Super Blood Moons (yes, we’re going to keep capitalizing that) are automatically superior to all other types of moons because they are a rare example of heroic space phenomena joining forces.

Here’s how it happens: every so often, a total lunar eclipse (that’s the “blood” part, because eclipses make the moon look redder than usual) occurs at the exact same time that the moon is both full and at the closest point to Earth in its orbit (that’s the “super” part, because it looks bigger than usual). The last one happened in 1982; the next one won’t happen until 2033, so you’d better look up on Sunday night if you want to view the moon using technology that you can still understand.

The moon will be visible on multiple continents. The Earth’s shadow will start moving across its surface at around 8:11 PM ET. NASA is providing special live coverage. Lots of people are excited.

There is a small subset of people, though, who have a nagging suspicion that the presence of such a super and bloody moon means that the apocalypse is here and we’re all going to be consumed in a fiery pit of hell. Recently, the Mormon Church had to tell its followers not to listen to the warnings of pastors who were spreading these rumors.

We’ll all just have to wait and find out if the Super Blood Moon is the last thing we see before our planet is destroyed. But hey, there are worse ways to go.