Supermoon to light up New Zealand skies tonight: Here’s everything you need to know

Tonight's supermoon will be just under 357,000km from Earth. Photo / Michael Craig

Kiwis planning to watch Guy Fawkes fireworks light up the sky could be in for a more spectacular sight tonight, with the largest supermoon of the year set to be visible.

“Tonight is the largest and brightest supermoon of the year,” Stardome New Zealand said in a post to social media.

“Be sure to catch the full moon rising during sunset in the east with a brilliant red hue.”

The Guardian reported the moon will be just under 357,000km from Earth – the nearest full moon of the year and therefore the largest supermoon.

It said it would appear 8% larger and 16% brighter than average.

It is the second supermoon this year after last month’s Harvest Moon and is one of four in four consecutive months.

Stardome astronomer Josh Aoraki told RNZ there were usually a few supermoons each year.

“The term ‘supermoon’ is more of a media term than a scientific one,” Aoraki said.

“The scientific term for what we are describing is what’s called perigee and apogee, they are the two points where the moon is at its closest and its furthest to Earth, and that’s because the moon’s orbit is elliptical. When you get the moon at its closest point during a full moon, that’s when we have a ‘supermoon’.”