The night sky has been putting on a show lately. On March 13-14, we witnessed one of the best lunar eclipses in recent times. But don’t worry if you missed it – there’s more to come this month. Experts are talking about a series of eclipses that started on March 14, 2025, and will continue throughout the spring equinox. The recent lunar eclipse coincided with the alignment of Mars, Jupiter, Venus, and Mercury, which has been happening since February.
This total lunar eclipse won’t be the only one this year. The same event will repeat on September 7 and will be visible from many parts of the world, including Spain. According to the National Astronomical Observatory, there are usually between four and seven eclipses every year, including solar and lunar ones. These events often come in pairs, with a solar eclipse happening about half a month after a lunar eclipse.
The upcoming lunar eclipse will be visible in its entirety in many parts of the world, including western Europe, Africa, the Americas, and Antarctica. In Spain, the eclipse will be visible in its entirety in the central and western regions, as well as in the Canary Islands and the cities of Ceuta and Melilla. However, in the eastern part of the peninsula and the Balearic Islands, the moon will set before the eclipse begins, so only the partial phase will be visible.
During the eclipse, the moon will take on a reddish-orange hue due to the way light behaves when it passes through the Earth’s atmosphere. This is similar to why the sky appears blue or why sunsets appear orange. The National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) explains that the moon appears red or orange during a lunar eclipse because the sun’s light has to pass through a thick layer of the Earth’s atmosphere, which scatters the shorter wavelengths of light.
This month’s astronomical events won’t end with the lunar eclipse. On March 29, there will be a partial solar eclipse, and on September 21, another partial solar eclipse will occur, although it won’t be visible from Spain. The National Astronomical Observatory notes that it’s common to see a partial solar eclipse from a given location about every two years, but total solar eclipses are much rarer.
In Spain, the last annular solar eclipse visible was in 2005, and the last total solar eclipse occurred in 1959, only visible from the Canary Islands. The last total solar eclipse visible from the mainland was in 1912. However, this “drought” of eclipses will soon end, with three eclipses visible from Spain in the next three years. On August 12, 2026, a total solar eclipse will be visible from the Iberian Peninsula for the first time in over a century, followed by another total solar eclipse on August 2, 2027, and an annular solar eclipse on January 26, 2028.
These events are not only exciting for astronomy enthusiasts but also for scientists, who can study the solar corona, a part of the sun’s atmosphere that’s usually too faint to observe. The National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) uses coronagraphs to block the sun’s light and simulate a total solar eclipse, but even with these instruments, it’s challenging to study the part of the corona closest to the sun, where many important processes occur that affect humans and technology on Earth.