Ring of fire: Indian Ocean to see solar eclipse

AFP on Yahoo ^ | 1/24/09 | AFP

[NormsRevenge]

PARIS (AFP) – A few lucky people in the Indian Ocean will be treated to a rare event on Monday when an annular solar eclipse will transform the Sun into a dark disc with a blazing ring-shaped corona around its rim.

In solar eclipses, the Moon moves between the Sun and Earth, casting its shadow on the terrestrial surface.

In an annular eclipse, a tiny shift in distance that results from celestial mechanics means the Moon does not completely cover the Sun's face, as it does in a total eclipse.

Instead, for those directly under the alignment, the Moon covers most of the Sun's surface, and a ring-like crown of solar light blazes from the edge of the disk.

For those watching from the fringe of the track, the Sun is partially obscured, as if a bite has been taken out of it.

According to veteran NASA eclipse-watcher Fred Espenak, the total eclipse track will run from west to east on Monday from 0606 GMT to 0952 GMT.

It will traverse the Indian Ocean and western Indonesia before petering out just short of Mindanao, the Philippines.

[NormsRevenge]

A few lucky people in the Indian Ocean will be treated to a rare event when an annular solar eclipse will transform the Sun into a dark disc with a blazing ring-shaped corona around its rim. (AFP/File/Jeff Haynes)

[J40000]

Wonder if the radical muzzies over there will see it as a sign from Allah to attack Israel and the US again!

[NormsRevenge]

Maybe it is just me but with less sunspots, we have more eclipses of late.. hmm.. or it's just the coverage they get.

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Let's get this FReepathon over the top before Hale-Bopp returns.. It's Easy!
Hit the button!

[NormsRevenge]

YouTube - Johnny Cash- Ring of Fire 1968
http://www.youtube.com/watch%3fv=Y2iv_E-Fn9E

This is from the year 1968 at the Grand Ole Opry, where Johnny Cash sung his 1963 hit, “Ring Of fire”. The song was written by June Carter, ..

[canuck_conservative]

Maybe Israel will interpret it as a divine sign to stomp on Gaza again.

[angelsonmyside]

Bump

[mikrofon]

It’s a sign from the heavens heralding the ascendancy of the Lord “O”...

[blueplum]

here's another article on the eclipse from space.com:

http://www.space.com/aol/090123-ns-solar-eclipse.html

“Unfortunately, virtually the entire annularity track falls over open waters, sliding first over the South Atlantic, and then tracking east, then northeast over the Indian Ocean. The eclipse reaches its maximum at local apparent noon, pretty much over the middle of the Indian Ocean. A shipboard observer would see the moon's dark outline wholly inside the sun for 7 minutes and 54 seconds, changing the sun into a “ring of fire.”

[mikrofon]

The view earlier today from Indonesia (home of "you-know-who"...)