BDN Interviews Davenport About Supermoon
The Bangor Daily News spoke with Alan Davenport, director of the Jordan Planetarium at the University of Maine, for an article about full moons in July, August and September that will look larger than normal. Davenport said the “supermoons” will especially look bigger when the moon is rising, because it occurs when the moon is at or near its closest orbital point to Earth. “The moon’s orbit is an elliptical one — it’s not a circle — so it’s constantly moving closer and further away from us,” Davenport said. “The supermoon cycle only occurs when you have both a full moon and at the same time you have a perigee — that is where it’s closest to the Earth in its orbit.”