Solar Eclipses Viewed From Space

lpb.fieldofscience.com

22 points·onreact-com··7 comments

I traveled all the way from Norway to witness the eclipse in Asia last week. Since most of HN is American, I assume that most people in here have never seen a total solar eclipse. You should. It's the most stunning natural experience I have ever had, and I happen to live in a place where beautiful nature is very common ;)

Just make sure you can be pretty certain that the sky will be clear during totality. The experience isn't about having a few minutes of darkness, it's a package deal. Black sun with visible corona, birds not singing, night-like darkness with dawn in every direction, the temperature dropping at noon..it's surreal.

I haven't seen any pictures or videos come close to giving justice to how it really feels. The dynamic range of our imaging equipment is far too low ;)

Some of the shadows appear to be mis-shapen (not circular). Is that due to the picture being a composite of several pictures taken over time, or is that some other phenomenon I'm not aware of? Maybe it's just me?

The Sun, Earth and Moon do not need to be in perfect alignment for a solar eclipse. You only have to be in the location of the Moon's umbra as it passes over the Earth. The Moon's shadow lengthens as it reaches the edge of the Earth.

I'm not sure whether the third image is a picture or a map projection.

In other words, the outline of the shadow should be a circle projected onto a sphere.

That's fascinatingly beautiful

To be honest to me it looks rather strange. Nonetheless it's a very unique glimpse we can get here. Thus I submitted it inspite of the lack of "beauty".

Strange but beautiful, at least to me.

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