3rd Of 4 Supermoons Rises Ahead Of Storied Geminids: What To Know In VA

The full cold moon on Thursday is the last chance in 2025 to see a supermoon, depending on sky conditions in Virginia.

The moon reaches peak illumination at 6:14 p.m. EST. The National Weather Service forecast calls for mostly sunny skies during the day on Thursday, but skies are expected to become mostly cloudy during the evening hours. The low temperature will be around 23 degrees.

Also this month, one of the most anticipated meteor showers of the year, the Geminids, reaches its peak.

Thursday’s supermoon, the second-biggest of 2025, will reach higher in the sky than any other this year. It’s the third of four supermoons that close out 2025 and open 2026. The full wolf supermoon is on Saturday, Jan. 3.

For the most dramatic views, watch around moonrise, which occurs around 4:14 p.m. in Northern Virginia. The moon will look especially huge as it hugs the horizon, but it’s a trick of the eye that astronomers call the “moon illusion.”

And because it’s a supermoon — when the moon is at perigee, or makes its closest approach to Earth in its orbit — it will continue to look larger as it rises higher in the sky. The difference is subtle to casual observers, but supermoons may appear up to 8 percent larger in diameter and 16 percent brighter than other full moons, according to The Old Farmer’s Almanac.

December’s full moon is often called the cold moon because it comes as freezing temperatures settle in for the winter.

Mohawk tribes first called December’s full moon the cold moon because it comes as frigid temperatures settle in for the winter. The Mohican people called it the Long Night Moon because it rises during the longest nights of the year near the winter solstice, and remains above the horizon for an extended period.

According to the almanac, other names for the moon are the drift clearing moon, frost exploding trees moon or hoar frost moon (Cree); moon of the popping trees (Oglala); snow moon (Haida, Cherokee); winter maker moon (Western Abenaki); moon when the deer shed their antlers (Dakota) and little spirit moon (Anishinaabe).

Ancient pagans in Europe referred to it as the “Moon Before Yule,” a name that honored the Yuletide festival and its celebration of the sun’s return.

Shooting stars from the annual Geminid meteor shower are already streaking across the sky. By the time the shower peaks, the overnight hours of Dec. 13-14, the moon will be a thin crescent. Up to 120 meteors an hour may be visible under ideal viewing conditions during the hours between 2 a.m. and dawn.

Also this month, the winter solstice occurs on Sunday, Dec. 21. It will be the shortest day of the year. We’ll have about 9 hours and 26 minutes of daylight in Northern Virginia on the first official day of winter.

The Ursids, a minor meteor shower, close out the year. The shower runs Dec. 16-26 and offers five or 10 shooting stars an hour at the Dec. 21-22 peak.

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