mixed form
A hybrid solar eclipse will be visible from Earth’s surface on April 20. It will be best viewed from the southern hemisphere, the southeastern Indian Ocean, Australia, Indonesia and the western Pacific. The biggest eclipse moment will begin at 7 hours 17 minutes Moscow time. Experts consider this phenomenon to be rare.
“A hybrid eclipse can be compared to a petrol or electric car.” – explains the Russian astronomer, senior researcher at the State Institute of Astronomy named after PK Sternberg, an associate professor in the Department of Physics at Moscow State University named after Lomonosov Vladimir Surdin. “So this eclipse has a variable quality. It starts out full but then takes the shape of a ring.”
Why is this happening? When the Moon comes so close to Earth, it appears large and completely covers the solar disk. And then the observer sees a beautiful solar corona against a dark sky. And when the Moon moves away from Earth, they are ring-shaped. In this case, the satellite cannot completely cover the Sun, the bright solar disk comes out from behind the Moon and the corona is not visible.
“In this case, the transition from total to annular occurs because the Moon passes an average distance from Earth. Since the Earth’s equator is closer to the Moon, and the poles are farther away (relative to the Earth’s radius), then when the moon shadow moves across the earth’s surface near the equator, we see a total eclipse, and when it approaches the pole, it is annular, ”said Vladimir Surdin.
It turned out that those who can see the eclipse at the very beginning will observe a total eclipse, and those who will be connected to this process later will see an annular eclipse.
The solar eclipse on April 20 is at 129th Saros. This is an approximate period of time during which lunar and solar eclipses occur. This period lasts about 18 years. This is because the relative positions and velocities in the Earth-Moon-Sun system are repeated with high accuracy at the end of each saro.
An eclipse like this can be seen in 2005 and the next one will be in 2041.
But these conditions are never exactly repeated, according to astronomer Surdin.
eclipse corridor
According to astrological terminology, the process called the eclipse corridor begins with the solar eclipse. It will end on May 5, the day of the lunar eclipse. This period is considered by astrologers as a real test period. That’s why they recommend being especially careful in any action, from negotiations to travel.
However, stating that, according to scientific data, this time is not distinguished by anything special, Vladimir Surdin noted that he learned with surprise that the expression “aisle of eclipse” is considered quite common.
Surdin stated that the concept of “eclipse corridor” has nothing to do with science.
However, belief in magic is characteristic of many people because it makes you hope that difficult problems can be solved without effort. Astrologers also help with these hopes. According to their advice, one needs to get rid of unnecessary things during eclipses. It is enough to write a list of “unnecessary” on a piece of paper and perform a certain ceremony at the “right” time.