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Everything you need to know about Thursday's supermoon

The last supermoon of the year lit up the skies over Alberta on Thursday night. 

Supermoon, a term coined by astrologer Richard Nolle in 1979 refers to a full moon at perigee.

What is perigee? Well, our moon orbits Earth in an ellipse(oval) pattern, so there is a point where the moon is at it's most furthest and closest distances to Earth.

When the moon's orbit is closest to the Earth it is at perigee, alternatively when the moon is at it's furthest point it's called the apogee.

Thursday night the moon was at perigee with Earth, making it look bigger and brighter than an average full moon.

In some cases the moon can appear as much as eight per cent larger than a full moon at it's average distance from Earth and up to 14 per cent larger than a full moon when at it's furthest distance from the earth (apogean full moon).

The moon can also appear 30 per cent brighter too.

Also, not only was Thursday night's full moon a supermoon, but it was also a Sturgeon Moon. Sturgeon Moon is a name used by The Old Farmer's Almanac.

At different points in the year full moons were given 'nicknames' according to their occurrence with what was happening at that time.

In North America, Indigenous groups and European settlers came up with these alternate names. S

turgeon Moon (August's full moon) came from the Great Lakes and Lake Champlain regions as this is when the Sturgeon fish were most readily caught.

Here are a few alternate August moon names, Harvest Moon (Dakota), Corn Moon (Algonquin) and Ricing Moon (Anishinaabe).

The next supermoon will be on August 1, 2023.

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