Solar Eclipse, Friday 20th March 2015

[Brian Yare]

Someone asked about this on another thread.

There will be a very very small partial eclipse of the sun here from about 1130 to 1156 on this day. It is extremely unlikely that you will notice anything in Luxor. Even at it's deepest, at 1143, the magnitude is only 0.13%, or 1 part in 700. There will be a slightly larger eclipse, but still less than 1% at Hurghada and no eclipse at all just south of Esna.

At Cairo the eclipse is about 6.5%, which may be just noticeable. For members in Glasgow there will be about a 95% eclipse. Even though it will probably be cloudy, the darkening that morning will be quite noticeable!

And for those who are interested, the Vernal (or Spring) Equinox is at 0045 on Saturday 21st March, Egyptian time.

Egyptian Summer Time is scheduled to start on 24th April, but as we all know this is a moveable feast!

I will try to find if any Luxor temples are aligned to the Equinox. But the Sphinx at Giza is. Also the valley temple of Khufu.

The Old Pylon of the Temple of Edfu and the Horemheb Chapel at Silsila were aligned to the vernal equinox, but I cant immediately spot anything nearer to Luxor.

[A-Four]

Thanks for the info Brian .

[garfield4]

having early morning party!

[Bullet Magnet]

As the eclipse plunges the UK and other places into darkness this Friday, two other rare if less spectacular celestial events will be taking place, too:

A Supermoon and the Spring equinox.

A Supermoon, or perigee moon, happens when the full or new moon does its closest fly-by of the Earth,
making it look bigger than it normally does. And the spring equinox refers to the time of the year when the day and night are of equal duration,
mid-way between the longest and shortest days.

The solar eclipse refers to a phenomenon where the sun and moon line up, so that the latter obscures the former. And while it won’t be affected by the two other events, it is rare that the three events happen even individually.


http://www.independent.co.uk/news/scien ... 11592.html

[newcastle]

How odd.

There was me thinking we had a spring equinox EVERY year, without exception.

Something else I've learned today

[Bullet Magnet]

I think it's more to do with the timing of these 2 events Newcastle, ( the New Moon and the Eclipse ) like many celestial events I have noticed over the last 4 or 5 years..
It's getting pretty interesting..

But, you know what the press are like, ? they love a good drama and beef it up.

[newcastle]

I think it's more to do with the timing of these 2 events Newcastle, ( the New Moon and the Eclipse ) like many celestial events I have noticed over the last 4 or 5 years..
It's getting pretty interesting..

But, you know what the press are like, ? they love a good drama and beef it up.

The occurrence of all three around the same time is rare.

I'm in London at the moment and fully expect grey obscuring clouds tomorrow morning

Hey ho