Partial Solar Eclipse

This morning (UK time) there was a partial eclipse of the Sun visible from many parts of the Earth. From the UK, the eclipse was already underway by the time the Sun was rising – but East of here people would have been able to see more of it.

A partial solar eclipse is where the Moon partly covers the face of the Sun. The Sun is so bright that if you don’t know a partial eclipse is occurring then you probably won’t notice anything unusual about the Sun. The only safe way to view the Sun is through a filter or via projection, but when it first rises and still lies on the horizon, you can safely look at it. This meant that this morning’s sunrise eclipse in the UK was, unusually, directly viewable for a short time.

Alas cloud totally covered the sky when I woke this morning – as it did it many parts of the UK. But for just a few minutes, and only near the horizon, the clouds briefly parted and let me spy the eclipse and take a few obscured shots through the rooftops near my house. The result is above.

This awesome shot was taken with a 37 GHz radio telescope at Metsähovi Radio Observatory in Finland. Thanks to Stuart and Evan for linking to these images.