The Hindu : New Delhi News : When the sun and moon come under a shadow

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Tuesday, Mar 14, 2006

New Delhi

New Delhi

When the sun and moon come under a shadow

Gaurav Vivek Bhatnagar

NEW DELHI: Eclipses usually come in interesting pairs. The occurrence of a solar eclipse is usually preceded or succeeded by a lunar eclipse separated by about 15 days. So while early on the morning of March 15 Delhi will witness the occurrence of a lunar eclipse, there will be a solar eclipse on March 29.

However, Nehru Planetarium director N. Rathnasree says it would not really be possible to discern this eclipse easily as this is a penumbral eclipse. In such an eclipse, there is only a partial dimming of the moon. A penumbral shadow is only a partial shadow and the moon passes through the penumbral shadow of the earth during such an eclipse. There may be a slight dimming of the moon, but a viewer without measuring equipment will not be able to discern this dimming.

And yet, Dr. Rathnasree says, this lunar eclipse is of interest in the sense that the whole moon will lie completely within the penumbral shadow of the earth from 4-48 a.m. to 5-48 a.m. on the morning of March 15.

Pointing out that during the entire 21st Century, there will be only five such events, even if unobservable, she says the eclipse itself will start at 2-42 a.m. and end completely at 7-44 a.m. Interestingly, the moon will also occult a faint star in the constellation of Leo, as seen from Delhi and other parts of North India. The star 89 Leo will emerge from behind the moon just as the penumbral eclipse has covered about half of the moon, around 3-50 a.m. A fortnight later, this celestial spectacle will be followed by the solar eclipse which will be visible from parts of Brazil, Ghana, Nigeria, Libya, Turkey, Georgia and Kazakhstan on March 29. From North India, this can be seen as a partial solar eclipse. The safe way of viewing the eclipse would be to project an image of the sun on to a screen, using a simple pinhole camera, a telescope or binoculars and observe all the visible phases of the eclipse. On that day, Nehru Planetarium in New Delhi will also be conducting an eclipse sky-watch for visitors and students. As seen from Delhi, the eclipse will start at 4-33 p.m. in the afternoon and end at 6-02 p.m. Sunset in Delhi on March 28 will be at 6-37 p.m. and so interesting views of the eclipse can be had against the backdrop of the city's monuments by those equipped with a digital camera with some optical zoom.

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