After nearly a week of leaden skies, yesterday turned out fine and we had a good view of the lunar eclipse, at a reasonable hour (between 6.50 and 7.20pm). I decided to photograph it, using my Panasonic camera on a tripod, automatic setting for night sky, and full zoom (14x). It came out reasonably well, though it would have been better to have had a greater zoom, and the right hand photo is a bit ‘soft’.
This was a ‘Blood Moon’, whose reddish-copper hue was caused by light bouncing off the Moon and being refracted through Earth’s atmosphere.
Martinborough Musings 
A small correction. I believe the colour is caused by the light passing through the earth’s atmosphere first, having the blue end of the spectrum being stripped out and being refracted enough for the, now reddish , light to go on to the moon. Your explanation is not in fact possible as the moon is totally eclipsed from the sun. Just so you can explain to anybody else that may object to your explanation. 🙂
That’s what you get for believing what you read in newspapers – in this case the Dominion-Post. Your comment can be the correct version…