December 2025: Expanded Events Calendar

The Live Events system has received a major overhaul, expanding from a handful of events to over 50 astronomical phenomena throughout the year.

New Event Types

Lunar Events

• Full moons with traditional names (Wolf Moon, Snow Moon, etc.)
• Supermoons highlighted with special severity
• New moons for optimal deep-sky observation

Eclipses

• Solar eclipses (total, partial, annular) through 2026
• Lunar eclipses with Blood Moon visibility
• Visibility regions and peak times included

Planetary Conjunctions

• Close approaches between planets
• Planet-Moon conjunctions
• Opposition events (Saturn, Jupiter at peak brightness)

Rocket Launches

• Major upcoming launches (Starship, Artemis II)
• Links to live webcasts
• Crewed missions highlighted

Smart Banner Filtering

The scrolling live events banner now intelligently filters events:

• Prioritizes ongoing events (shown first)
• Shows only notable+ severity to reduce noise
• Sorts by date proximity for relevance
• Caps at 10 events for smooth animation

UX Improvements

Click-to-Scroll

Clicking an event in the banner now scrolls directly to that event on the Events page with a temporary highlight effect.

Show More Pagination

Events page now loads 8 events initially with a "Show More" button to progressively reveal the full list.

Responsive Cards

All event cards are now clickable, linking to relevant external resources (IMO, NASA, TimeAndDate, etc.).

Technical Details

| Component | Changes | |-----------|---------| | real-time-events.ts | Added getLunarEvents(), getEclipses(), getPlanetaryConjunctions(), getUpcomingLaunches() | | LiveEventsBar.tsx | Priority filtering, limit to 10 events | | events/page.tsx | Pagination state, Show More button, scroll-to behavior | | astronomy.ts | New EventTypes: 'lunar', 'conjunction' |

What's Next

• Integration with launch APIs for real-time schedule updates
• User location-based visibility filtering
• Event reminders and notifications