Ring of light: Total eclipse over Svalbard islands in Arctic

A partial solar eclipse could be seen Friday across Europe and parts of Asia and Africa.

March 20, 2015 04:58 pm | Updated 04:58 pm IST - LONGYEARBYEN, Norway

A total solar eclipse as seen in Longyearbyen on Svalbard on March 20, 2015. A partial eclipse was visible on Friday, the first day of northern spring, across parts of Africa, Europe and Asia.

A total solar eclipse as seen in Longyearbyen on Svalbard on March 20, 2015. A partial eclipse was visible on Friday, the first day of northern spring, across parts of Africa, Europe and Asia.

Sky-gazers in the Arctic were treated to a perfect view of a total solar eclipse on Friday as the moon completely blocked out the sun in a clear sky, casting a shadow over Norway’s remote archipelago of Svalbard.

People shouted, cheered and applauded as Longyearbyen, the main town in Svalbard, plunged into darkness. The skies were clear, offering a full view of the sun’s corona a faint ring of rays surrounding the moon that is only visible during a total solar eclipse.

A few hundred people had gathered on a flat frozen valley overlooking the mountains, and people shouted and yelled as the sudden darkness came. A group of people opened bottles of champagne, saying it was in keeping with a total solar eclipse tradition.

“I was just blown away. I couldn’t believe it,” said Hilary Castle, 58, from London.

“It was just fabulous, just beautiful and at the same time a bit odd and it was too short,” said Mary Rannestad, 60, from Minnesota.

A solar eclipse happens when the moon lines up between the sun and the Earth. This casts a lunar shadow on the Earth’s surface and obscures the sun. During a partial eclipse, only part of the sun is blotted out.

A partial solar eclipse could be seen Friday across Europe and parts of Asia and Africa. Britain’s Met Office said 95 percent of the sun was covered in the Hebrides, Orkneys and Shetland Islands, and one per cent less further south in Glasgow and Edinburgh.

In Copenhagen, the sun was 85 per cent covered up while 80 per cent was hidden in southern Sweden. Cloudy weather put a lid across large parts of the continent, making it hard to see the eclipse. However, a thin cloud cover allowed people in Stockholm to watch the eclipse without protective glasses, as the faint disk of the sun could be seen through the overcast sky.

The last total eclipse was in November 2012 over Australia. The next one will be over Indonesia in March 2016, according to NASA.

Though some enterprising eclipse-seekers got exactly what they were hoping for, others were less lucky. A blanket of clouds in the Faeroe Islands in the North Atlantic blocked thousands of people from experiencing the full effect of the total eclipse.

The Faeroes and Svalbard were the only two places on land where the eclipse was total. About 20,000 visitors had travelled to the two remote island groups to watch the spectacle.

Despite the clouds in the Faeroes, tourists and residents in Torshavn alike hooted and applauded as the daylight dimmed for about 2 minutes and 45 seconds.

“It was a pretty big disappointment not to be able to see the sun,” said Janaki Lund Jensen, who had sailed from Copenhagen with 884 others to see the eclipse. Hotel rooms have been booked for years as thousands came to the Faeroe Islands to try to see the eclipse.

Sigrun Skalagard, in the northern parts of the Faeroes, said birds there went silent and dogs started howling.

“Some people were surprised to see how fast it became dark,” she said.

0 / 0
Sign in to unlock member-only benefits!
  • Access 10 free stories every month
  • Save stories to read later
  • Access to comment on every story
  • Sign-up/manage your newsletter subscriptions with a single click
  • Get notified by email for early access to discounts & offers on our products
Sign in

Comments

Comments have to be in English, and in full sentences. They cannot be abusive or personal. Please abide by our community guidelines for posting your comments.

We have migrated to a new commenting platform. If you are already a registered user of The Hindu and logged in, you may continue to engage with our articles. If you do not have an account please register and login to post comments. Users can access their older comments by logging into their accounts on Vuukle.