Sunday's super flower blood moon from the Eugene night sky

Eugene's night sky was clear Sunday and spectators were able to view the "super flower blood moon" lunar eclipse from Skinner Butte.

A lunar eclipse occurs when the Earth is between the full moon and the sun. 

During the eclipse, the moon only receives sunlight bent through the Earth's atmosphere and changes color over the minutes, from gray to pink to orange to red. 

The Earth's shadow covers the moon, which often has a red color, hence the blood moon nickname. Although it's completely in the shadow of Earth, a bit of reddish sunlight still reaches the moon.

Sunday's eclipse began when the Earth's shadow appeared on the moon at 10:27 p.m. EDT. Over the course of an hour, the shadow crept across the moon, plunging the lunar surface into darkness. 

Totality, or when the moon is entirely in the Earth's shadow, was from 11:29 p.m. May 15 to 12:53 a.m. May 16.

What is a supermoon?

A supermoon means the moon looks a bit bigger than usual since it's a bit closer to the Earth.

"Because the orbit of the moon is not a perfect circle, the moon is sometimes closer to the Earth than at other times during its orbit," according to NASA.

On average, supermoons appear about 7% bigger and about 15% brighter than a typical full moon.

The Old Farmer's Almanac reports that there will be four supermoons in 2022. 

It's also the 'flower' moon

Sunday's sky show is also the "flower" moon, a name given to May's full moon because "flowers spring forth across North America in abundance this month," the Old Farmer's Almanac said.  

The full moon names used by the almanac come from a number of places, including Native American, Colonial American and European sources. Traditionally, each full moon name was applied to the entire lunar month in which it occurred, not solely to the full moon.

Other names for May's full moon include the corn planting moon and the milk moon, NASA said.

Contributing: Emily DeLetter, The Cincinnati Enquirer