The 1999 February 16 Solar Eclipse

This is another SPECIAL Page from the

Calwell Lunar Observatory

N O W see the images and animations below:

Introduction

Just south of Geralton in Western Australia in the afternoon of Tuesday 1999 February 16 between 3:38 and 5:58 pm local time, there was an annular solar eclipse. While this is obviously NOT a lunar eclipse, this observatory mounted an expedition to observe this eclipse but was NOT able to provide a web broadcast of this dramatic astronomical phenomena, as we observed Baily's beads from a location outside of the telephone network area.

The eclipse could be viewed live from my home page where a direct link has been established to my friend Olivier Staiger's page.

The eclipse commenced when the moon first contacted the lower edge of the sun (first contact) at 4h56m37.3s (UT), with greatest eclipse at 6h33m33.8s and conjunction of moon and sun at 6h20m20.8s. The sun was not fully eclipsed by the moon, but covered 99.3 % of its surface - this gave a very narrow annulus of the sun's photosphere at totality (as shown below). The eclipse ended when the moon left the sun (fourth contact) at 8h10m36.1s.

This eclipse was ideal to record the phenomena of numerous Baily beads where the sun's photosphere appears in the valleys of the moon's rough limb similar to the well known "diamond ring". We observed at a suitable site at the Southern limit about 30 % inside of the inner, or true annularity zone to maximise the number of Baily beads. It is hoped that other observers placed near both limits of the shadow path of the moon, which is only 28 km wide at greatest eclipse, will provide data to determine the exact diameter of the sun.

A portable colour video camera fitted with a reduced aperture solar filter was hand guided to captured images of the eclipse - see the animation and the test images below of the normal sun using this instrumentation.

Now that I have returned from Perth here is an animated GIF sequence which shows the annular phase of the eclipse, I have made no effort to centralise these images as the hand guiding and the very strong wind gusts are reproduced in FULL to show some of the difficulties experienced at this most exciting eclipse. If you look closely at each image you may see the elusive Baily's beads revealed particularly near the cusps of the sun.

If you use this Animation please credit the Calwell Lunar Observatory

We were within the Southern limit of the eclipse path at the Mount Horner property where we observed

the northern mountains and valleys of the moon. The times given are in (UT) universal time (+0h 0m 33s fast).

A comprehensive report with all our timings of Bailey's beads is included here.

Here are two test images taken on 1998 December 8, using a full aperture solar filter - the time shown here is Universal Time or UT. Image 1 and Image 2.

Both images were captured using a Sony Handycam TR511E and 2X telephoto lens with a double layer of aluminised mylar acting as a solar filter and processed with a Macintosh IIci and QuickImage 24 card. Image 2 has been processed from a colour image.

If you would like to travel to the 1999 August 11 total solar eclipse to be observed in Amasya Turkey, please see Active travel.

The 1999 February 16 Annular Solar Eclipse

What it did really look like.

Just click the Maris Redshift image below to see the Solar eclipse

the central path of annularity will be just south of Geraldton in Western Australia.

This is the annularity observed at mid-eclipse, there is a very thin line almost completely around the moon which is the photosphere of the sun, under higher magnification we can see Baily's beads.

Page maintained by the Calwell Lunar Observatory, Australia updated on 1999 March 10, changed 2001 March 30.

Return to the Lunar Eclipse Finder Finder.html