Pics of the Longest Solar Eclipse of the Century

Vinod writes "Yesterday thousands of people around Asia witnessed the longest solar eclipse of the century. Although it was not clearly visible in some parts due to overcast weather, thousands of people gathered to view this spectacular event. Yesterday's solar eclipse lasted for 6 to 7 minutes, making it the longest solar eclipse of the century. Here is a collection of 33 beautiful images of the solar eclipse from around the world."

Comments

Where are my superpowers?

[Helmholtz]

I thought eclipses were supposed to cause super powers ... or was it that they took them away? *shakes fist*

Re:Where are my superpowers?

[Fleeced]

And surely, that last eclipse on Heroes was the longest, rather than this one - certainly more than a few measly minutes! Not to mention the global coverage! (And please don't complain about spoilers... after the decline since season 1, you can't possibly complain)

Re:Where are my superpowers?

[Chris Burke]

And surely, that last eclipse on Heroes was the longest, rather than this one - certainly more than a few measly minutes! Not to mention the global coverage!

Obviously the result of an as-yet-undiscovered Hero with Super Solar Eclipse powers. Or maybe even something more powerful, like General Purpose Plot Device powers... though I guess that'd be redundant with just about everyone else.

(And please don't complain about spoilers... after the decline since season 1, you can't possibly complain)

Speaking of spoilers, about the only thing I liked about the dumb season 3 finale (even though I liked the season overall) was that they gave a Season 4 sneak-peak that "spoiled" the twist that Sylar was gonna figure out he was Sylar. Because if they'd even tried to pretend that was a surprise...

boston dot com

[bigdaddyhame]

these pics look much bigger nicer over at boston.com's The Big Picture, where they were posted yesterday and no doubt scooped and scaled for your link.

http://www.boston.com/bigpicture/2009/07/the_longest_solar_eclipse_of_t.html

Re:boston dot com

[interkin3tic]

these pics look much bigger nicer over at boston.com's The Big Picture, where they were posted yesterday and no doubt scooped and scaled for your link.

To TFAs credit, they didn't just steal the images and scale them: they also did some editing. Specifically they left out the picture of people, including several gross old men, getting into the ganges.

Old man nipples and cherrios don't make for a good morning for me.

Re:boston dot com

[haifastudent]

The nicest picture of the eclipse was posted here, though:
http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2006/03/0329_060329_eclipse.html

I literally said "wow" out loud when I saw that.

Re:boston dot com

[Anonymous Coward]

Those are still pretty much postage sized. In these days of 1920x1200 and 2560x1600 displays, you would think people would stop using such low resolution images.

Re:boston dot com

[bigdaddyhame]

The nicest picture of the eclipse was posted here, though:
http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2006/03/0329_060329_eclipse.html

"my god, it's full of stars!"

Re:boston dot com

[bigdaddyhame]

I think bandwidth and copyright concerns have more to do with it than the size of people's monitors.

Re:boston dot com

[Anonymous Coward]

And this is why North America (assuming that's where you're from) is so screwed up. Even things that aren't even remotely, slightly sexual, but show *gasp* skin, are seen as vile, and need to be hidden from sight.

God I hate this continent sometimes.

Re:boston dot com

[Anonymous Coward]

Even the largest of pictures have miniscule filesizes, unless you think that a meg or two is too much. Besides, people who don't want to see high res images don't have to download them, they can just look at the tiny pictures. The site hosting images shouldn't post any unless they are capable of handling the bandwidth for decent sized pictures.

So publishing a picture at a higher resolution violates copyright somehow? How does that work?

Re:boston dot com

[bigdaddyhame]

the larger the image size the easier it is to print postcards of it or manipulate it for profit.

and in terms of bandwidth, a few hundred K might not seem like a lot but when you have hundreds of thousands of visitors each day, it makes a difference - especially considering the website in question, boston.com, is a newspaper's website - and we all know how well newspapers are doing these days.

Re:boston dot com

[Anonymous Coward]

Great photo - I can't believe that it's so small though! Even on the nasa site the photo is tiny compared to usual astronomy photos - I wanna view this in as much detail as possible, full screen! C'mon NASA, sort it out...!

Re:boston dot com

[bigdaddyhame]

NASA posts all astronaut photography on its website in a variety of resolutions, including the original full-size file. Usually within a day or so of the images being taken and transmitted back to earth.

Here's a page with photos of the eclipse from March 26, 2009: http://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/station/multimedia/ISS_eclipse_03292006.html

Re:boston dot com

[interkin3tic]

Even things that aren't even remotely, slightly sexual, but show *gasp* skin, are seen as vile, and need to be hidden from sight.

OR I was making a joke about how ugly old man nipples are. Sexual? You're either perverted, can't read, or have never seen old man nipples.

God I hate anonymous trolls.

Multiple sunglasses

[MyLongNickName]

the dude with four pairs of glasses looking at the solar eclipse. Is that even safe? I understand most sunglasses don't even block the dangerous rays and make it even worse to look toward the sun as your eyes are more dilated and the harmful rays burn your eyes even more.

Comments?

Re:Multiple sunglasses

[Anonymous Coward]

Mod parent down. All GP did was ask a question.

Re:Multiple sunglasses

[clone53421]

Here's a comment for you: Be nice.

Oh, and try taking your own advice.

Hey, that rhymed...

Re:Multiple sunglasses

[Deadstick]

No, probably not safe. A #14 welding filter works fine.

rj

Re:Multiple sunglasses

[Chris Burke]

Yeah, cus who gives a fuck if someone thinks that will work and ends up blinding themselves staring at an eclipse!

Seriously, whoever shit in your cheerios this morning, it wasn't the OP.

(it was me)

Re:Multiple sunglasses

[haifastudent]

How about the kid under his father with the camera. The kid is obviously looking right at the event!

Re:Multiple sunglasses

[Anonymous Coward]

What do you care? All of the things to say about this event, and you choose this?? Get a f**ckin life, b*tch.

Oh really?

[FlyingSquidStudios]

The longest eclipse of the century, eh? If it were 2099 instead of 2009, that would be much more impressive.

Re:Oh really?

[Kufat]

When they say the longest eclipse of the century, they mean 2001-2100.

Re:Oh really?

[funkatron]

Even tho it's early in the century, it might well be the longest eclipse of the century. I imagine that the calculations to predict eclipses and their duration would be relatively straightforward by modern standards. You probably wouldn't even need to take relativity into account.

Re:Oh really?

[eln]

They failed to take into account the meteor that will strike Earth in 2027, knocking it into a different orbit, and therefore changing the timing and characteristics of future eclipses. VH1 is really going to regret running that "I Love the Solar Eclipses of the 2000s" show so early.

Re:Oh really?

[bheekling]

Eclipses might not happen at all in that case. Remember that the distances of the Sun and Moon from Earth are *just* right for the Moon to exactly cover the Sun during an eclipse.

Re:Oh really?

[Anonymous Coward]

Parent post is marked Redundant and the GP Insightful? Slashdot has gone beyond retarded.

Re:Oh really?

[commodoresloat]

Some things are obvious early on. For example, the movie "Battlefield Earth" was released in May of 2000, and critics quickly concluded that it was not too early to declare it the worst movie of the century.

Re:Oh really?

[commodoresloat]

That "whooshing" sound you hear overhead is not the sound of another solar eclipse.

Re:Oh really?

[religious freak]

No, more like I can't mod shit on this thread for some unknown, cosmic reason (I was going to fix what you cite)...

This resource is no longer valid. Please return to the beginning and try again.

FRUSTRATION... /. why is this still an issue after these many years? :P

Re:Oh really?

[HTH NE1]

For example, the movie "Battlefield Earth" was released in May of 2000, and critics quickly concluded that it was not too early to declare it the worst movie of the century.

Well, 2000 was the last year of the 20th Century of the Current Era.

Re:Oh really?

[haifastudent]

Even tho it's early in the century, it might well be the longest eclipse of the century. I imagine that the calculations to predict eclipses and their duration would be relatively straightforward by modern standards. You probably wouldn't even need to take relativity into account.

They're posted here:
http://eclipse.gsfc.nasa.gov/eclipse.html

Re:Oh really?

[syousef]

Even tho it's early in the century, it might well be the longest eclipse of the century. I imagine that the calculations to predict eclipses and their duration would be relatively straightforward by modern standards. You probably wouldn't even need to take relativity into account.

They're not. You don't need GR, but you do need a lot of calculus and geometry. I've done an Astronomy masters by coursework and we didn't even attempt to cover this.

Good approximations however were worked out by the earliest civilizations...Read about the Saros cycle here:
http://www.ulo.ucl.ac.uk/public/eclipse/ecl_calc.html

Re:Oh really?

[commodoresloat]

Perhaps but they were talking about the 21st century ;)

Blogspam - See Boston.com

[g00set]

http://www.boston.com/bigpicture/2009/07/the_longest_solar_eclipse_of_t.html

MOD PARENT UP

[gEvil (beta)]

Someone mod the boston.com link up. It's the original source for that collection, and the pics are much nicer looking.

"Longest this century"

[uncledrax]

aka "Longest Eclipse in the last 8 years!" ?

Re:"Longest this century"

[thisnamestoolong]

Ok we don't need to make this personal (although I've got to admit that seeing the word 'dicklicker' did make me laugh), but yes, you are correct. We can figure out with a great deal of precision the relative position of the Earth, Sun, and Moon many centuries in advance, so this will indeed be the longest solar eclipse that the Earth will see this century.

Re:"Longest this century"

[yincrash]

I'm going to shoot lots of rockets at the moon to alter it's orbit to one that makes an even longer one.

Re:"Longest this century"

[uncledrax]

Ah sorry, neither TFA nor the summary (which is just the text from TFA) indicated any talk of the future. Usually when media say things including time frames, it's done as 'to date'. The fact that a media outlet might actually look into the future or report actually correct information strikes me as more uncommon then eclipses ;]

Re:"Longest this century"

[digitalunity]

Simple logic implies this would not work. If the moon were closer, it would need to orbit the earth faster to keep from descending into the planet.

If it were going faster, it wouldn't be in line for an eclipse as long as it is now. If the moon were farther away from the earth, it could orbit slower which would make the eclipse last longer, but might not be a full eclipse.

I'm no astrophysicist, but it seems to me the only easy way to make a solar eclipse last longer would be for the moon to get bigger. So instead of shooting rockets to make move the moon, let's pile up all the lawyers and politicians on the moon. That should make for at least a 10 minute eclipse.

Re:"Longest this century"

[ekimminau]

No. Actually, the longest of the century: http://eclipse.gsfc.nasa.gov/SEsaros/SEsaros136.html

Re:"Longest this century"

[pinkj]

Ok we don't need to make this personal (although I've got to admit that seeing the word 'dicklicker' did make me laugh), but yes, you are correct. We can figure out with a great deal of precision the relative position of the Earth, Sun, and Moon many centuries in advance, so this will indeed be the longest solar eclipse that the Earth will see this century.

maybe the Earth did, but I didn't. :(

Solar eclipse glasses

[amstrad]

Queue jokes about solar eclipse sunglasses made in china ...
in 3... 2... 1...

Re:Solar eclipse glasses

[Anonymous Coward]

Why would we joke? I imagine them to be amazingly effective at protecting your eyes, and rather affordable. After all... they're made of lead!

Re:Solar eclipse glasses

[Anonymous Coward]

"Queue" ? You must be joking, dicklicker.

Awesome....

[vampire_baozi]

But here in Beijing, all I could see was a think cloud of haze. I couldn't even find the bloody sun. So I went back inside and went to sleep.

Must be a Slashdotter

[jayme0227]

I'm guessing that the guy with 3 pairs of sunglasses over his regular glasses must have been a slashdotter. Where else would you find such ingenuity (and such nerdiness)?

Whoever you are, I salute you, my friend.

Re:Must be a Slashdotter

[Anonymous Coward]

Especially a solution that, as pointed out earlier in the comments, actually isn't very effective in protecting your eyes. Yep, definitely a slashdotter.

Re:Must be a Slashdotter

[Em Emalb]

I'm guessing that the guy with 3 pairs of sunglasses over his regular glasses must have been a slashdotter. Where else would you find such ingenuity (and such nerdiness)?

Whoever you are, I salute you, my friend.

I don't always stare at a solar eclipse, but when I do, I wear three pairs of sunglasses. Stay sightless, my friends.

Everyone brags to have the longest solar eclipse

[Anonymous Coward]

When the average solar eclipse is much smaller than 6 minutes.

What glasses are those?

[wandazulu]

Many of the pics show people wearing what look like disposable glasses to view the eclipse; I thought looking at the sun at any time was a Really Bad Idea (tm) and during an eclipse was supposedly an Even Worse Really Bad Idea.

I guess they now make thin films that are so dark as to be safe to look at the sun now?

Re:What glasses are those?

[Sockatume]

One of the big chemical companies is churning out a mylenised film that makes for an effective pair of eclipse glasses. It's a really bad idea to look directly at the sun during an eclipse because the iris expands in response to the low mean light level and provides little to no protection from the high peak light level when the photosphere is visible. Wearing the mylenised glasses doesn't make your iris expand any wider, but it does cut down that peak light level dramatically.

Re:What glasses are those?

[Anonymous Coward]

Actually, during totality, looking at the sun (or rather, the moon and the solar corona) completely unfiltered is a Not Bad If You Know What You're Doing Idea. But you're supposed to look away as soon as totality ends, and it's easier to recommend nobody looks at all than to try educating people on the difference between total, partial, and annular eclipses, and the different stages of a total eclipse.

And since the introduction of arc welding, suitable thin films have been used in lenses for welding helmets. It's my understanding that these are frequently peddled in disposable holders for viewing solar eclipses.

Re:What glasses are those?

[TheBusiness]

A possible theory / Haiku for the situation..... Will look anyway Cannot produce when blinded Government stepped in

Re:What glasses are those?

[nacturation]

Would not four pairs of sunglasses achieve the same effect? In essence, the radiation emanating from the sun during an eclipse is no different than during regular daylight, and if sunglasses are effective for normal use then using a sufficient number of pairs (of sufficiently dark glasses) should be equally effective during an eclipse.

Re:What glasses are those?

[bigg_nate]

Those glasses are *very* dark. They let through something like 10^-6 of the light, making it safe to look directly at the sun through them. Other than the sun, all you see is black.

They're only useful during the partial phase of the eclipse. During totality, they're not necessary, and in fact you won't be able to see anything with them on.

Re:What glasses are those?

[CastrTroy]

Even most $5 sunglasses say they block 100% of UV rays. So I don't see why a single pair of sunglasses wouldn't suffice. If they truly do block 100%, then what is getting through that is hurting my eyes?

Re:What glasses are those?

[bigg_nate]

I think both visible and infrared light can hurt your eyes in these kinds of intensities. But also, I'm guessing "100%" doesn't literally mean 100%, like how "no trans fat" just means less than half a gram per serving.

Re:What glasses are those?

[HTH NE1]

I thought looking at the sun at any time was a Really Bad Idea (tm) and during an eclipse was supposedly an Even Worse Really Bad Idea.

But... that's where the fun is!

Re:What glasses are those?

[Anonymous Coward]

I agree with that!
Todd DiRoberto
http://www.emediawire.com/releases/americansatellite/todddiroberto/emw2401714.htm

Re:What glasses are those?

[Anonymous Coward]

Visible spectrum light is perfectly capable of damaging your eyes.

Re:What glasses are those?

[wandazulu]

Well, the pictures did show some runners in the night...

Re:What glasses are those?

[nacturation]

Well, most lasers don't emit radiation in the UV spectrum, so according to your theory those shouldn't hurt your eyes either! In reality, the energy from sufficiently strong radiation in spectra other than UV can damage your eyes.

The Asia?

[Anonymous Coward]

Is that somewhere in the vicinity of The Iraq?

Answer

[interkin3tic]

Where else would you find such ingenuity (and such nerdiness)?

Yonsei University in Seoul, South Korea according to boston.com.

I remember a partial eclipse here in the states, apparently people were staring at the sun through CDs, which were ineffective. There were warnings on the news to that effect.

The guy taking the picture through exposed X ray films... without knowing anything about those specific films, I'd guess that they wouldn't be doing anything to block UV rays. Does anyone know if they actually do?

Re:Answer

[TheLostSamurai]

The guy taking the picture through exposed X ray films... without knowing anything about those specific films, I'd guess that they wouldn't be doing anything to block UV rays. Does anyone know if they actually do?

I think that might have been artistic and not an attempt to increase safety.

Real men of genius

[the_humeister]

We salute you, Mr. Uses-three-pairs-of-sunglasses-to-look-at-the-solar-eclipse guy!

Aye, look what ye've doon NOW...

[kale77in]

There's a cool scene in U2's video for The Unforgettable Fire, where they're recording at Slane Castle (as you do), and go outside to see an eclipse, whereupon someone who looks like a neighbouring farmer says...

Aye, look what ye've doon NOW with yrr bloody rork music.

Oh, and it's spelt "TEH ASIA".

OBPinkFloyd

[Anonymous Coward]

Everything under the sun is in tune, but the sun is eclipsed by the moon.

"nearly 6 to 7 minutes"?

[Anonymous Coward]

How about "6m39s"? Some people forget that we have freaking good models and instruments nowadays. Even if you don't know that, it should be intuitive that we wouldn't be able to determine which one is the longest of the century with only minute-level precision.

Was this the longest solar eclipse of the century?

[uassholes]

TFS doesn't make it very clear. It should have stated it a few more times.

When "The Media" hypes science stories they always proclaim this kind of shit. What they don't say, for instance, is how much longer is this eclipse than the second longest one.

Maybe one millisecond, who knows.

3-D Glasses

[Anonymous Coward]

It appears that even the Universe is jumping on the 3-D band wagon. I hope it was better than Spy Kids 3-D.

Re:Was this the longest solar eclipse of the centu

[clone53421]

Actually, that's an interesting point. What's the typical length of a solar eclipse?

I'd actually expect most total eclipses to last about the same length... the moon covers the sun, the moon's speed doesn't vary all that much. Well, I guess the earth's speed does vary on its elliptical orbit (angular velocity varies, while the area swept is constant, something like that... I'm not sure what the correct terminology was), so since the earth's speed varies, the length of an eclipse might be longer or shorter depending on whether the earth was closer to the perigee or apogee of its orbit.

Also, what's with the invisible rectangle obscuring the lower-right corner of the text entry on here? I can see what I'm typing, but I can't use the mouse to control the cursor in that region. It changes to the normal pointer instead of the text-select I-beam.

Re:Was this the longest solar eclipse of the centu

[Sockatume]

I've had that "invisible rectangle" since coming onto FF3.5. I suspect some obscure bug in the slashcode.

Copied from Flickr

[ankitasdeveloper]

All of these are taken from Flickr and without sticking (c) notice.. Heck !!

Re:Copied from Flickr

[ankitasdeveloper]

Here is the link http://www.flickr.com/photos/rainbow9/

Lunar Shadow

[Thyamine]

After reading about this the other day I was trying to find some nice pictures of the lunar shadow on the earth. Have there been any pics of it from high up? I found one or two blurry shots from a plane, but nothing that really looked inspiring.

Re:Lunar Shadow

[Ericular]

Maybe India will release a video soon:

A 10-member team of scientists from the premier Indian Institute of Astrophysics in Bangalore and the Indian air force filmed the eclipse from an airplane, an air force press release said. But millions across India shunned the sight and planned to stay indoors.

Interestingly enough, the next paragraph is a huge WTF:

Even in regions where the eclipse was not visible, pregnant women were advised to stay indoors in curtained rooms, due to a belief that the sun's invisible rays would harm the fetus and the baby would be born with disfigurations, birthmarks or a congenital defect.

Why would the moon being in front of the sun make these "invisible rays" more dangerous than being in direct sunlight?

Re:Lunar Shadow

[Samgilljoy]

Religion doesn't have to make sense; it just has to keep you in your place. Then again, governments use the same tactic: "There's a threat, an invisible threat, your freedom must be restricted. See? You weren't harmed by the threat only I can see. I saved you. Now, go back to work."

Oblig Simpsons Quote

[Mastadex]

The goggles! They do nothing!

Re:Was this the longest solar eclipse of the centu

[nomorecwrd]

mmmm... Using Chrome, that corner lets me resize the text entry box.

Off-topic, I know.... just trying to help.

Re:Was this the longest solar eclipse of the centu

[haifastudent]

Not that one. Fx 3.5 highlights a bug in the slashcode. What you are seeing in Chrome is added to every textarea automatically by Chrome itself, not a bug in the slashcode.

How To View?

[number17]

And this is how you view a solar eclipse: http://news.wenxuecity.com/messages/200907/news-gb2312-891058.html

See YOU on the Dark Side of the Moon

[starglider29a]

Isn't it amazingly COOL how the best pictures of the eclipse are those which include people and their living?

Science isn't everything. Coincidence of congruent angles isn't as cool as people living under an eclipse.

We are ALL lucky to live on this planet. How many other planets have eclipses like these?

Re:See YOU on the Dark Side of the Moon

[Quirkz]

Obligatory: 42. Or over 9000. I'm not sure which.

boston dot com link should be used over this one

[Anonymous Coward]

People here complain all the time about "big media" stealing from bloggers, so why should we reward this blogger with clicks, when it's an obvious lift of boston.com's images from the "The Big Picture" section, just so the blogger can drive impressions to his page (which, if you noticed, is inundated with ads).

Here's the boston.com link.

cue, you jackass

[Anonymous Coward]

cue, cue, cue, cue, cue! For god's sake! IT'S THE OBVIOUS WORD! quit trying so fucking hard!

Re:cue, you jackass

[HTH NE1]

Ohh....

  ¿ Qué ?

Re:Was this the longest solar eclipse of the centu

[Anonymous Coward]

It's a feature in all webkit based web browsers, Safari and Midori also have this. It comes in handy when site administrators make the textbox too damn small.

Can see why this would be regarded as meaningful

[PaganRitual]

... by sufficently primitive people. It's quite amazing to see, but also quite freaky at the same time. I can imagine people who didn't understand the concept of planets and moons and the sun and how they all fit together to find this sort of thing as indicative of some greater event. I suppose you'd also have to have quite a self-centered view of the universe to believe that way, but I guess that's part and parcel with not understanding what is going on; if you don't get it, assume it's all about you.

The Eclipse Pics I took from Japan

[Pikoro]

Here's a collection of the pictures I took of the eclipse: http://owh.net/?YEYnRRguJY

It's my first time photographing an eclipse so the pictures aren't "Professional Quality" but they're not awful either.

My experience

[tanveer1979]

I saw the eclipse from Delhi. 83% totality.
However it was cloudy till 6:30am. 6:26 was the max phase.
From 6:30 to 6:45 clouds relented, and I could actually take a few pics.
Here you go!
http://tanveer.smugmug.com/gallery/8996323_Jy27n

millions observers

[Anonymous Coward]

the number of observes should be in the millions if not hundreds of millions considering the best observing area is in China and India