Provided the sky is clear, those who look to the sky Sunday night will be in for quite a treat as a full lunar eclipse of a super moon will happen shortly on the evening of Jan. 20.

The lunar event will begin subtly at 8:36 p.m. A total lunar eclipse occurs when the moon and the sun are on exact opposite sides of Earth. At that point, the Earth blocks the sunlight that normally reaches the moon. Instead of that sunlight hitting the moon’s surface, Earth's shadow falls on it.

At 9:34 p.m. a partial eclipse will be noticeable, then leading totality at 10:41 p.m. The eclipse will be at its height at 11:12 p.m. The entire event ends at 11:44 p.m.

The gazing may be especially spectacular since this will be the first super moon of 2019. Super moons can make the moon look significantly bigger and 30 percent brighter. It is caused by its close proximity to the Earth. It will be the first of three super moons in 2019. The others will be on Feb. 19 and March 21. Of these, the Feb. 19 full moon will be the closest and largest full super moon of 2019.

In addition to being an eclipsed super moon, the event will happen on a blood moon. Although the moon is in Earth's shadow, some sunlight still reaches the moon. The sunlight passes through Earth's atmosphere, which causes the atmosphere to filter out most of the blue light, giving it the reddish (blood) color.