Re: Annular Eclipse - October 2005
- From: pausch@xxxxxxx (Paul Schlyter)
- Date: Tue, 09 Aug 2005 11:43:21 GMT
In article <8gpff1tkvgerc1q7qo5spq0k11ku15465i@xxxxxxx>,
FH <FHMAN@xxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
> On Fri, 5 Aug 2005 15:50:39 -0700, "Howard Lester" <hlester@xxxxxxxx>
> wrote:
>
>>> Can anyone say whether it's worth travelling to see this?
>>> Have never seen an annular eclipse and there are cheap flights to
>>> Alicante.
>>>
>>> Is it worth the time/expense?
>>
>> It depends on the magnitude. If it's just a basic "ring," then no - I
>> wouldn't recommend it. Nothing happens that is any different from a deep
>> partial eclipse. The scene changes, the temperature drops, and that's about
>> it.
>
> I agree. I viewed the May 30, 1984 annular eclipse from Piedmont Park
> in downtown Atlanta, Georgia. Many local amateurs were there and set
> up scopes with projection, etc. A fledgling cable news company was
> also there (CNN). This was an annular eclipse VERY close to total,
> i.e. it was 99% covered.
>
> 1) It is simply amazing how bright just 1% of the sun can be!!! Can't
> say it ever truly approached night-time darkness.
Cutting down the Sun's normal brightness by a factor of 100 is indeed
far from enough to approach night-time darkness. If we by "night"
mean a night with a full moon (horribly bright for those hunting for
DSO's, but approximately the same brightness as the sky during a total
solar eclipse), well that's about half a million times fanter than a
clear daytime sky. So if you cut down the Sun's brightness by a
factor of 100, you'd have to cut down THAT reduced brightness by an
additional factor of 5000 to reach the darkness of a night with a
full moon.
> More like what you experience when a very dark rain cloud passes in
> front of the sun.
>
> Incredulous to me, there were people walking around the park totally
> oblivious to what was happening in the sky. Unless you looked up and
> noticed that it was a perfectly clear day the amount of darkness
> wouldn't be that surprising.
>
> 2) You CANNOT look directly at the sun during an annular solar
> eclipse -- it's still a partial eclipse and your eyes can be damaged.
> (The exception to this is when the annular phase is near sunrise or
> sunset.)
>
> 3) As an amateur astromer, I found the event itself was fantastic.
> Especially viewing it via projection. I did look near the sun during
> the annular phase and found Venus. When I told some interested
> bystanders to try this they refused! (Probably rightly so. The sun
> was quite bright, but I wasn't staring at it -- only looking around
> the sun.)
>
> So, to answer your question...
>
> YES -- an annular solar eclipse is well worth your time to attend if
> it is nearby. NO -- I would not travel a long distance to see an
> annular eclipse.
I'm a bit perplexed by your post: what you say here is that you would not
travel a long distance to see an event you consider fantastic. How come?
Or did you perhaps exaggreate a bit when you said you found the event
"fantastic" ?
--
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e-mail: pausch at stockholm dot bostream dot se
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