Does Halloween 2015 Fall on a Full Moon?

 

Witches, black cats and a full moon – what’s more Halloween that that? Will we be seeing a perfect trifecta at Halloween this year?

There’s a lot of moon folklore. Farmers believe corn planted under a waning moon grows slower but yields larger ears. Some believe babies born a day after a full moon enjoy great success and endurance in life. Seeing a new moon in your dreams promises a happy marriage and increased wealth. A full moon is considered unlucky if it falls on a Sunday but lucky if it falls on a Monday.

A full moon occurs every 29.5 days – the duration of one complete lunar cycle. For 2015, there is no full moon on Halloween. The nearest full moon to that date is October 27th. The following full moon is November 25th. There is no full moon for Halloween 2015. That would probably be pretty overwhelming for some people. Halloween is already on a Saturday. This means crime will probably be up for this Halloween. A full moon would make it worse. Or would it?

Is it simply an urban legend which states that crime, hospital visits and the like rise when there’s a full moon?

In 2003, Bloomberg reported that “Car accidents occur 14 percent more often on average during a full moon than a new moon, according to a study of 3 million car policies by the U.K.’s Churchill Insurance Group Plc.”

Psychologist Ivan Kelly, a well-known researcher in Canada, doesn’t believe the full moon has any effect on human beings. He thinks it’s completely ludicrous and said so in the following statement he gave to National Geographic: “The studies are not consistent. For every positive study, there is a negative study. Journalists pay too much attention to finding sensational news or news that will support interesting results. Hence [they] ignore the findings of studies and tend to prefer stories or anecdotes from policemen or nurses.”

Famous psychiatrist Glenn Wilson has this to say about the full moon cycle, “There is good reason to believe that people’s personalities do change around the time of the full moon, not because of any astronomical force, but because it creates the optimum lighting conditions for feeling carefree and mischievous.”

However, science does not deter the many who celebrate full moons. There are websites all over the internet about setting up your own full moon ritual.

Some yogis ‘swallow the moon’ by using the moon’s energy to retain their youthfulness. It’s called, ‘Drinking in the moon.” You can read more about it here.

Instead of breathing in the moon’s power, some people believe in drinking in the power. Using the drink method, fill a glass with water and leave it outside. In the morning, the water and you will have harnessed the properties of the moon. Read more here.

Some people go a step further and make moon wishes. The idea here is to write down your goals but align them with the moon’s energy. You’re to think in 2-week and 6-month cycles, as the moon does. A new moon means you should make a new goal. A full moon means you should be finishing what you started 2 weeks ago.