Freaky Friday: Crazy Skies and Celestial Events

A full “blood moon” held in the sky for over an hour on 3/15/25. The total lunar eclipse arrived late Thursday night and peaked at 1:30am Friday morning. The weather on Friday certainly was freaky all across Texas, capping off a full week of howling winds and red flag fire warnings. Skies turned red at midnight, and upon daybreak, dust storms turned sunrise a spectacular burnt orange. Friday's winds didn't hit Del Rio as hard as the March 4th storm where we faced 60mph gusts, but other cities around the state weren't as lucky.

The National Weather Service (NWS) issued a series of red flag warnings that started Wednesday and continued through to the weekend. Wildfires have taken the entire state of Texas by storm this March. Spring temperature changes across the globe have made Texas weather a little squirrely this season. Record high wind speeds, with gusts reaching upwards of 65mph, and an unwavering drought have turned the lone star state into one giant red flag warning. This week alone, Del Rio sustained winds of 20-30 mph, with 35mph gusts. The one upside to all this wind? Clouds were all blown away, mostly out of sight, providing a prime view for the eclipse.

Del Rio has seen 2 total eclipses within the last year, a rare fortuity. The total solar eclipse global event on 4/8/24 drew in visitors from across the nation to our little town, including Nasa scientists. Friday’s total lunar eclipse also attracted visitors to the Texas border, thanks to our reputation for clear skies and bright stars. Del Rio was smack-dab in the middle of the path of totality for the Solar Eclipse, and it’s an astronomical phenomenon that again, for Friday’s lunar eclipse, Del Rio found itself central to path of totality. Out of the entire world, the combined best view of both events was Del Rio, Texas.

Meteorologist Alexander Menchaca said the total lunar eclipse began at 10:57pm on Thursday, reached its maximum at 1:58am on Friday, and ended at 5:00am. Gleaming more than 65-minutes of totality. Before Friday, a blood moon had not occurred anywhere on the planet since the winter of 2022. Del Rio will get to experience its next total lunar eclipse on 3/3/26.

Blood moons occur when the Sun, Moon, and Earth come into 100% alignment. Usually, the sun illuminates the moon a brilliant white, but during a total lunar eclipse when the moon fully blocks out all sunlight, the moon solely becomes illuminated by refracted light filtered through Earth's atmosphere. Basically, sunlight visible on the other side of the planet bounces around the atmosphere and some of the longest light wavelengths (red-brown hues) make it back into space.