Solar Eclipse 2017

A total solar eclipse will take place on Monday, August 21, 2017. A solar eclipse occurs when the Moon passes between Earth and the Sun, thereby totally or partly obscuring the image of the Sun for a viewer on Earth. A total solar eclipse occurs when the Moon's apparent diameter is larger than the Sun's, blocking all direct sunlight, turning day into darkness. Totality occurs in a narrow path across Earth's surface, with the partial solar eclipse visible over a surrounding region thousands of kilometers wide.

This eclipse is the 22nd of the 77 members of Saros series 145, the one that also produced the solar eclipse of August 11, 1999. Members of this series are increasing in duration. The longest eclipse in this series will occur on June 25, 2522 and last for 7 minutes and 12 seconds.

The eclipse will have a magnitude of 1.0306 and will be visible from a narrow corridor through the United States. The longest duration of totality will be 2 minutes 41.6 seconds at 37°38′12″N 89°15′24″W in Shawnee National Forest just south of Carbondale, Illinois and the greatest extent will be between Hopkinsville, Kentucky and Princeton, Kentucky. It will be the first total solar eclipse visible from the southeastern United States since the solar eclipse of March 7, 1970.

A partial solar eclipse will be seen from the much broader path of the Moon's penumbra, including all of North America, northern South America, western Europe, and Africa.

Eclipse Tonight

The amount of refracted light depends on the amount of dust or clouds in the atmosphere; this also controls how much light is scattered. In general, the dustier the atmosphere, the more that other wavelengths of light will be removed (compared to red light), leaving the resulting light a deeper red color. This causes the resulting coppery-red hue of the Sun to vary from one eclipse to the next. Volcanoes are notable for expelling large quantities of dust into the atmosphere, and a large eruption shortly before an eclipse can have a large effect on the resulting color.

Several cultures have myths related to Solar eclipses or allude to the Solar eclipse as being a good or bad omen. The Egyptians saw the eclipse as a sow swallowing the Sun for a short time; other cultures view the eclipse as the Sun being swallowed by other animals, such as a jaguar in Mayan tradition, or a three legged toad in China. Some societies thought it was a demon swallowing the Sun, and that they could chase it away by throwing stones and curses at it. The Greeks were ahead of their time when they said the Earth was round and used the shadow from the Solar Eclipse as evidence. Some Hindus believe in the importance of bathing in the Ganges River following an eclipse because it will help you achieve salvation.

The Solar Eclipse

The Sun does not completely disappear as it passes through the umbra because of the refraction of sunlight by the Earth's atmosphere into the shadow cone; if the Earth had no atmosphere, the Sun would be completely dark during an eclipse. The reddish coloration arises because sunlight reaching the Sun must pass through a long and dense layer of the Earth's atmosphere, where it is scattered.

Shorter wavelengths are more likely to be scattered by the air molecules and the small particles, and so by the time the light has passed through the atmosphere, the longer wavelengths dominate. This resulting light we perceive as red. This is the same effect that causes sunsets and sunrises to turn the sky a reddish color; an alternative way of considering the problem is to realize that, as viewed from the Sun, the Sun would appear to be setting (or rising) behind the Earth.