Full Wolf Moon, Eclipse Livestream: How To Watch In Metro Denver

There’s a lot of hype surrounding Friday’s full moon, but nope, we won’t see the penumbral lunar eclipse here in Denver's metro area — in fact, the only place you’ll be able to see it in North America is online — but a bright sky beckons if you want to start 2020 off with a howl.

And speaking of howling and moons, did you know that January’s full moon is called the wolf moon? There are at least a couple of theories, which we’ll get into, but if you’re going to howl at the moon, you need to know how to dress.

There will be a mostly clear sky over metro Denver Friday night, but with a low of 15 degrees, you'll want to bundle up.

You’ll need to know the best times to howl, dance or whatever primordial tradition to celebrate the big, bright orb in the sky. That’s moonrise and moonset. In metro Denver, the moon rises at 4:58 p.m. on Friday and sets at 8:12 a.m. on Saturday.

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And if you want to get in the mood for all that lunar revelry, check out the penumbral lunar eclipse — an imperfect alignment of the sun, Earth and moon that casts a shadow over the moon’s face — via an online feed from the Virtual Telescope Project, beginning at 6 a.m. Eastern Time Friday. The telescope is trained over the skyline of Rome.

So, why is this weekend’s attraction called the wolf moon?

That January’s full moon marks a particularly dangerous time of year when people are more easily transformed into werewolves is the most interesting, though least plausible, theory behind the moniker. Modern authors like Stephen King in “Cycle of the Werewolf” have kept the ancient myth in play.

The more pervasive story is that early Native American tribes began calling it the wolf moon because the animal’s howl penetrated their winter camps on cold January nights. However, scientists told Business Insider says there’s no evidence that wolves or any other member of the canine family behave any differently during a full moon.