Whether you are a seasoned moon gazer or merely seeking to gape at the beauty of a full moon, this year there will be not one but 4 supermoons to spot in Singapore. The moon, which is Earth’s closest companion, is the one celestial neighbour that has always entranced us, and everyone can see all over the world, in the night sky. A supermoon is a full moon that occurs when the moon’s orbit is closest to the Earth, which makes it appear brighter and larger than the usual full moon. Monday’s supermoon was the first of four this year to grace the sky. The Science Centre’s observatory said that in addition to Monday’s supermoon, skywatchers could look forward to three other supermoons this year, which are the Sturgeon Moon on August 1st, the Blue Moon on August 31st, and the Harvest Moon on September 9th.
Even though Mr Hesham Suleyman was all excited about catching the supermoon last evening, given the cloudy sky, he was prepared to be disappointed. The 48 year old civil servant told the Straits Times that he was hoping to catch the supermoon yesterday, however since it was a cloudy day with 100% cloud cover, he did not expect a clear supermoon, or may not even get a chance to see it at all. But when he saw the supermoon or the buck moon peeping through the clouds at around 8 p.m. from the kitchen window of his Tampines flat, his spirits quickly lifted. He said he was delighted to see it appear even though it was brief, and added that he quickly captured the moment using his Samsung S2 Ultra.
Mr. Quek Song Chye, another resident said that the weather on Monday was not as ideal as last year for moon gazing, when he had a good view of the supermoon in August. He said he started waiting for the moon to rise from 6.30 p.m. and that by 7.09 p.m. there had still been no sight of the moon because of the low clouds that were blocking it. The 59 year old clinic manager said that eventually the moon came out at 7.28 p.m., and added that he had only about 15 minutes to snap up some photos from the staircase of a Pasir Ris flat before the moon went into hiding behind the cloud once again.
37 year old Mr. Bryan Ho captured the supermoon from an HDB block in Clementi at 7.13 p.m. with the Ayer Rajah Telephone Exchange building in the foreground. He said he always planned his shoots in advance and had started taking pictures of the moon since 2018. Mr. Ho who worked previously in product marketing for digital imaging said that he normally coordinated with a few others to plan and check out locations before they gathered on that day to photograph the supermoon together. But on Monday he stated that had been alone except for a couple of friends who had just come to watch since everyone else was busy or thought it would be too cloudy to photograph the supermoon.
Fiona Tan, a Civil servant who is in her 40s said that she was at home with her family when she saw the supermoon from the balcony of her flat in Punggol. She said she was pretty excited although it was not the first time that she spotted the supermoon from her home.
A few pictures of the supermoon were also snapped up by Senior Manager Ivan Lee, 47 with his Nikon P900 from the top floor of a multi storey car park near his HDB block in Redhill.
