Free Republic

"You've heard of the supermoon before, and we have three of them this year. The first occurs Saturday, August 29th. A supermoon refers to a full or new moon when it's at its closet point (called the perigee) to Earth in its orbit. The moon can appear up to 30% larger than it's normal size from Earth. The full moon occurs at 11:35 a.m. MST on Saturday, so the moon technically won't be 100% full when it rises in the east at 6:54 p.m., but we won't be able to tell.

The largest full moon of 2013, a so-called "supermoon," will light up the night sky this weekend, but there's more to this lunar delight than meets the eye. On Sunday, June 23, at 7 a.m. EDT (1100 GMT), the moon will arrive at perigee — the point in its orbit its orbit bringing it closest to Earth), a distance of 221,824 miles. Now the moon typically reaches perigee once each month (and on some occasions twice), with their respective distances to Earth varying by 3 percent.