November’s Hybrid Eclipse: First Reports November 3rd’s eclipse, during which the Moon’s shadow traced out a ribbon of darkness some 8,500 miles (13,600 km) long but only 36 miles (58 km) across at its widest. Owing to Earth’s curvature, this intriguing event began as a barely annular eclipse in the western Atlantic Ocean that quickly transitioned to full totality before sweeping across central Africa. At the western end, a group of intrepid observers chased the Moon’s shadow aboard a Falcon 900B aircraft that took off from Bermuda. Timing was critical, given the ultra-narrow shadow, but the team reports qualified success. “We agree this one is still too close to call,” comments participant Liz O’Mara. “Our possible choices for the seconds of totality seen are 1, 0, and less than 0.” The longest duration, 99 seconds, would have been seen from a spot in the Atlantic southwest of Liberia. No one saw that, but a few ships were in the area. Passengers aboard the yacht SeaDream, positioned at 14.1° N, 31.8° W, dodged clouds to get mostly into the clear. “Fortunately, we got away from the really opaque high stuff,” reports Michael Gill, “and we were able to just see a watery-looking Sun with inner corona. No outer corona could be picked up.” A large group aboard the Corinthian, positioned at 5.7° N, 16.6° W, fared better, witnessing 90 seconds of totality in clear skies. The Moon’s umbra raced eastward and reached the African coast at 13:51 Universal Time. Again, clear skies were the rule. Viewing from Port Gentil, near the centerline, Terry Cuttle was part of a small group of eclipse-chasers who saw totality perfectly for the first 25 seconds and then another 45 seconds though a very thin cloud.
Posted on: Mon, 04 Nov 2013 18:39:32 +0000
Trending Topics
Recently Viewed Topics
© 2015