Wednesday, July 22, 2009

Longest Eclipse of 21st Century

It's awesome... I saw today the longest solar eclipse of the century. It's been visible across Asia and part of it was here in Japan. The solar eclipse lasted for about more than 6 minutes.
A solar eclipse occurs when the moon passes between the Sun and the Earth so that the Sun is fully or partially covered. This can only happen during a new moon, when the Sun and Moon are in conjunction as seen from the Earth.

Below is a partial solar eclipse over Shizuoka City... pics courtesy by Yauchi kun taken from the ground of SAME office before our radio recording.

It's partly cloudy here in Shizuoka City but we are blessed to gaze the partial solar eclipse between the clouds. It was about past 11:00 a.m. when for the moment the sun disappeared and the sky totally turned into darkness then lightened. Pretty amazing to see especially on tv this somewhat like a black hole in the sky surrounded by a halo of lights--- especially the scene of somewhat like a diamond ring as what they described it here. Ohh yes... that is what we call a beauty of natural phenomenon!

According to experts the next longest total solar eclipse will occur on June 13, 2132. OMG... that means this is my first and last experience of long solar eclipse! Sigh!

If you missed the solar eclipse here in Japan... here some footage from NHK

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