Solar eclipse of May 20, 2012

Solar eclipse of May 20, 2012
	Map
Type of eclipse
Nature	Annular
Gamma	0.4828
Magnitude	0.9439
Maximum eclipse
Duration	5m 46s
Coordinates	49.1N 176.3E
Max. width of band	237 km
Times (UTC)
(P1) Partial begin	20:56:07
(U1) Total begin	22:06:17
Greatest eclipse	23:53:54
(U4) Total end	1:39:11
(P4) Partial end	2:49:21
References
Saros	128 (58 of 73)
Catalog # (SE5000)	9535

An annular solar eclipse took place on May 20, 2012 (May 21, 2012 for local time in Eastern Hemisphere), with a magnitude of 0.9439. A solar eclipse occurs when the Moon passes between Earth and the Sun, thereby totally or partially obscuring the image of the Sun for a viewer on Earth. An annular solar eclipse occurs when the Moon's apparent diameter is smaller than the Sun, causing the Sun to look like an annulus (ring), blocking most of the Sun's light. An annular eclipse appears as a partial eclipse over a region thousands of kilometres wide. This is also known as Ring of Fire.^[1]

[edit] Visibility

The annular phase was visible at sunrise on May 21 from the Chinese coast, northern Taiwan, the south of Japan, and before sunset on May 20th from the western part of the United States. Guangzhou, Taipei, Tokyo and Albuquerque were on the central path. Its maximum occurred in part of the North Pacific, south of the Aleutian islands for 5 min and 46.3 s, and finished in the western United States.^[2]

North America

It was the first central eclipse of the 21st century in the continental USA, and also the first annular eclipse there since the solar eclipse of May 10, 1994 which was also the previous eclipse of this series Solar Saros 128.

Animation as viewed from Albuquerque, New Mexico, showing sunset before the eclipse ends	Animation of eclipse path from space

[edit] Photo Gallery

Asia

Kofu, Yamanashi, Japan

North America

Crescent shadows on an outdoor wall
San Francisco, California.
Crescent shaped shadows from tree on a wall
San Francisco, California
Crescent images from solar eclipse, May 2012
San Francisco, California
Minneapolis, Minnesota
01:28 UT
Near Phoenix, Arizona
Shawnee Mission ParkShawnee, Kansas
East of Ogden, Iowa at 01:25 UTC
Photo taken from San Juan Capistrano, CA at 01:20 UT
Eclipse as seen from Flagstaff, Arizona
Photo taken from San Francisco, California
Center line, south shore of Pyramid Lake (Nevada) in Nevada.
Projection method using 60mm refractor from Medford, Oregon.
2012-05-20 Eclipse as seen from Wolfforth, Texas.
Partial Solar Eclipse in Salt Lake City, Utah.
Amateur scientists observing eclipse in Albuquerque, New Mexico. They are using colored filtered glasses for safe viewing provided by the Department of Physics and Astronomy at The University of New Mexico.

[edit] Related eclipses

[edit] Solar eclipses 2011-2014

This set of solar eclipses repeat approximately every 177 days and 4 hours at alternating nodes of the moon's orbit.

Note: Partial solar eclipses on January 4, 2011 and July 1, 2011 occur in the previous lunar year eclipse set.

Solar eclipse series sets from 2011–2014
Descending node		Ascending node
118	June 1, 2011 Partial	123	November 25, 2011 Partial
128	May 20, 2012 Annular	133	November 13, 2012 Total
138	May 10, 2013 Annular	143	November 3, 2013 Hybrid
148	April 29, 2014 Annular	153	October 23, 2014 Partial

[edit] Saros 128

It is a part of Saros cycle 128, repeating every 18 years, 11 days, containing 73 events. The series started with partial solar eclipse on August 29, 984 AD. It contains total eclipses from May 16, 1417 through June 18, 1471 and hybrid eclipses from June 28, 1489 through July 31, 1543. Then it progresses into annular eclipses from August 11, 1561 through July 25, 2120. The series ends at member 73 as a partial eclipse on November 1, 2282. The longest duration of totality was 1 minutes, 45 seconds on June 7, 1453.^[3]

Series members 52-62 occur between 1901 and 2100:

52	53	54
March 17, 1904	March 28, 1922	April 7, 1940
55	56	57
April 19, 1958	April 29, 1976	May 10, 1994
58	59	60
May 20, 2012	June 1, 2030	June 11, 2048
61	62
June 22, 2066	July 3, 2084

[edit] Metonic series

The metonic series repeats eclipses every 19 years (6939.69 days), lasting about 5 cycles. Eclipses occur in nearly the same calendar date. In addition the octon subseries repeats 1/5 of that or every 3.8 years (1387.94 days).

This series has 21 eclipse events between May 21, 1993 and May 20, 2069.

May 20-21	March 9	December 25-26	October 13-14	August 1-2
118	120	122	124	126
May 21, 1993	March 9, 1997	December 25, 2000	October 14, 2004	August 1, 2008
128	130	132	134	136
May 20, 2012	March 9, 2016	December 26, 2019	October 14, 2023	August 2, 2027
138	140	142	144	146
May 21, 2031	March 9, 2035	December 26, 2038	October 14, 2042	August 2, 2046
148	150	152	154	156
May 20, 2050	March 9, 2054	December 26, 2057	October 13, 2061	August 2, 2065
158
May 20, 2069