I've been learning about the lunar phases and then came across this photograph of Mauna Kea.

 

The photo seems to show sunrise in Hawaii throwing Mauna Kea's shadow over the atmosphere, so that we can see the moon through this shadow.

 

What confused me is this:

 

From the shadow of the mountain the Sun would appear to be low in the sky behind the viewer and the mountain and to the left.

 

However from the phase of the moon (which appears to be a waxing crescent), the Sun should appear relatively near the Moon in the sky, seemingly below the horizon to the right of the picture in front of the viewer and the mountain...

 

Can anyone set me straight?

---

Merged post follows:

Consecutive posts merged

Of course the second I post the question, I find a link explaining the photo.

 

I won't post the explanation yet, who can work it out for themselves?

The name of the image file, MKeclipse_mukensnable.jpg, pretty much gives it away. The photographer's name is Alex Mukensnable. The MK stands for Mauna Kea. What's left? Eclipse.

 

The picture is of a lunar eclipse as seen from the top Mauna Kea.

The Moon is partially in the shadow of Earth.

 

Text under the Picture

"Explanation: Just opposite the setting Sun, the already-eclipsed Moon rose over the Hawaiian Islands on February 20. A view near the 14,000 foot peak of volcanic Mauna Kea on the Big Island, a popular spot for astronomers, offered this remarkable play of shadows and sunlight. With snowy cinder cones in the foreground, the Moon lies within the shadow cast by the mountain -- a shadow extending across a lower cloud deck and on through Earth's dense atmosphere. As the lunar eclipse is drawing to a close, the curved shadow of the limb of planet Earth itself can also be traced across the Moon's surface, some 400,000 kilometers away."

http://apod.nasa.gov/apod/ap080301.html

 

Lunar eclipse

"A lunar eclipse is an eclipse which occurs whenever the moon passes behind the earth such that the earth blocks the sun’s rays from striking the moon. This can occur only when the Sun, Earth, and Moon are aligned exactly, or very closely so, with the Earth in the middle."

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lunar_eclipse

Yeah, d'uh it was an eclipse!

In my defense I found a link direct to the photo w/o explanation whilst looking for stuff about lunar phases which confused me mightly.