If you’re in the right place, you’ll see the Moon pass in front of the Sun.
This photographer used a Canon R3 mirrorless camera with a 600mm lens at f/4 to record images of the October 14, 2023 annular eclipse from Sevier, Utah.
Credit: Philippe Mousset
An annular eclipse of the Sun will occur on Tuesday, February 17. However, there’s a problem: It will only be visible as a ring with a thin line in Antarctica. In the southern tip of Chile and Argentina and Mozambique, Madagascar and South Africa, as well as parts of the Atlantic, Pacific and Indian Ocean, the eclipse will be partial.
Three types of solar eclipses are possible. The first, and most impressive, is a total solar eclipse, during which the Moon covers the entire visible disk of the Sun. The second type is an annular eclipse (of which this is an example), where the Moon moves across the Sun centered on its disk but the apparent size of our satellite is too small to cover the entire disk. Therefore the Moon leaves a ring of the Sun around the dark circle created by it. The word “ring” in Latin is ringHence it is an annular eclipse. Solar eclipse type three is the least spectacular, a partial eclipse. Any solar eclipse at any location where there is not a total or annular eclipse is a partial eclipse.
Heading south?
From Antarctica, the Moon will cover about 92.5 percent of the solar disk at the middle of the eclipse. Annular phase, when a ring of the Sun surrounds the Moon, will last for a maximum of 2 minutes and 20 seconds. In contrast, from Punta Arenas, Chile, the moon will cover less than 2 percent of the sun’s disk. Now it is a partial eclipse!
It must be said that very few people will travel to the extreme southern reaches of our world to witness this phenomenon. However, if you are one of them, and if you find some photos, please send them to me at michael.bakich@firecrown.com. May you be successful!
