While those who missed out on the harvest moon may be disappointed, there are more supermoons to come before the end of the year.

What is a supermoon?

The moon’s closest point to Earth is known as perigee, and during its 27-day orbit around Earth, the moon reaches both its perigee, about 363,000km from Earth, and its farthest point — or apogee — about 405,500km from Earth.

“Because the Earth’s orbit doesn’t move too much between months, you kind of get them in a row. So if there’s a supermoon one month, it’s very likely that the month either side of it will also be a supermoon because it’s not moving too much, so it’s also going to be very big,” Batten said.

“Tides are going to be stronger during a full moon — but even bigger during a supermoon, so you might get an even bigger king tide if it’s the right circumstances for that.”

Wait, what is a full moon again?

That’s because the sun’s light reflects off the moon back onto the Earth.

This week’s harvest moon, as seen from London. Source: Getty / Dan Kitwood

The opposite of a full moon in the lunar cycle is what’s known as a new moon.

“If you put the moon on the same side of the Earth as the sun — so you’ve got the sun, the moon in the middle, and then the Earth on the other side — you’re going to get a ‘new moon’, so it’s going to be very, very dark.”

‘No-one talks about micromoons’

A ‘micromoon’ is the opposite of a supermoon and occurs when the moon is at its furthest point away from Earth in its elliptical orbit, making it appear quite a lot smaller.