Come March 3, a total lunar eclipse is set to make the moon appear bright red in the night sky – that said, it’ll really be more of an ‘early morning’ sky for Coloradans, with the estimated mid-point of totality expected to be about 4:33 a.m.

In Colorado, totality is expected to stretch from about 4:04 a.m. to 5:03 a.m. mountain time – just 59 minutes. After that, a waning eclipse should be present until about 6:18 a.m., at which point the celestial show will conclude, according to Sky and Telescope.

A blood moon is the result of the earth working its way directly between the sun and the moon, with red light getting refracted and passing through the atmosphere to illuminate the moon’s surface. A notably long lunar eclipse took place in July of 2018, lasting an hour and 43 minutes to become the longest in roughly a century, according to Business Insider. The upcoming lunar eclipse will be shorter than most of those that have occurred in recent years.

Per a report from Griffith Observatory, lunar eclipses tend to happen about twice a year with favorable alignments meaning a lunar eclipse can be visible for up to half the globe.

With the upcoming lunar eclipse, Coloradans should be able to see it pending cloud coverage. It will, however, require an early wake-up call.

Learn more about lunar eclipses from NASA here.

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