UPDATED: Blood-red supermoon: Your pictures of last night's rare celestial event

For the first time in 30 years, earth, sun and moon were correctly aligned to produce the rare, celestial event.

The weather over Bolton stayed mainly clear, enabling skywatchers to witness a moon 14 per cent larger than usual on Sunday night into Monday morning, September 27-28.

Then, as the moon passed into the earth’s shadow, it turned a blood-red in colour.

It’s first time since 1982 that the event has taken place. And if you missed last night’s light show, you’ll have to wait until 2033 to see it again.

Here we feature some of your best images taken on Sunday evening.

Len Adam of Bolton Astronomical Society took this wonderful phase of shots between 1am-5.30am on Monday morning:-

What is a lunar eclipse?

A lunar eclipse occurs when the moon passes through the earth’s umbra (shadow). The earth’s shadow darkens the moon slightly, before the phenomenon of Rayleigh Scattering (the same effect that makes sunsets appear orange and the sky blue) makes the moon appear blood red.

What is a supermoon?

A supermoon occurs when a full moon coincides with the closest pass the earth makes to the moon during its elliptical orbit – known as the perigee. A supermoon can appear up to 30 per cent brighter than at the earth-moon apogee (when the two bodies are furthest from one another).