Solar eclipse, moon with bright ring to be visible Monday morning in PHL

Filipinos may be among the lucky ones to see an annular eclipse of the Sun on Monday, where the moon appears with a bright ring of light visible at the edges.

The US National Aeronautics and Space Administration said the solar eclipse will be visible from within a narrow corridor along Earth's northern Hemisphere.

"For the May eclipse, the moon will be at the furthest distance from Earth that it ever achieves – meaning that it will block the smallest possible portion of the sun, and leave the largest possible bright ring around the outside," it said.

It said the eclipse will be seen in eastern Asia, crossing the North Pacific Ocean, and ending in the western United States.

A partial eclipse will be visible from a much larger region covering East Asia, North Pacific, North America and Greenland.

The next solar eclipse will be the total solar eclipse on November 13, 2012.

Schedule

The Philippine Atmospheric Geophysical and Astronomical Services Administration (PAGASA) said the eclipse will also be visible in China, most of Russia, Southeast Asia including Indonesia, Hawaii, Arctic regions and most of North America.
 
“In the Philippines, the event will be observed as a partial solar eclipse,” PAGASA administrator Nathaniel Servando said on PAGASA’s astronomical diary for May.

PAGASA said a Maximum Eclipse is expected in Metro Manila at 5:58 a.m. on Monday, with the eclipse ending 7:06 a.m.

The schedule of maximum eclipses in other areas include:

Laoag: maximum eclipse 6:02 a.m., ends 7:12 a.m.
Tuguegarao: maximum eclipse 6:01 a.m., ends 7:11 a.m.
Baguio: maximum eclipse 6:00 a.m., ends 7:09 a.m.
Angeles City: maximum eclipse 5:59 a.m., ends 7:07 a.m.
Puerto Princesa City: maximum eclipse 5:55 a.m., ends 6:58 a.m.
Lucena City: maximum eclipse 5:57 a.m., ends 7:05 a.m.
Legaspi City: maximum eclipse 6:01 a.m., ends 7:11 a.m.
Cebu: maximum eclipse 6:01 a.m., ends 7:11 a.m.
Zamboanga: maximum eclipse 6:01 a.m., ends 7:11 a.m.
Jolo, Sulu: maximum eclipse 6:01 a.m., ends 7:11 a.m.
Davao: maximum eclipse 6:01 a.m., ends 7:11 a.m.

Annular eclipse

Servando said a solar eclipse occurs when the Moon passes between Earth and the Sun, totally or partially obscuring the image of the Sun as viewed from the 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) and blocking most of the sun’s light.

Servando said an annular eclipse appears as a partial eclipse over a region thousands of kilometers wide.

Meanwhile, NASA said a joint JAXA/NASA Hinode mission will observe the eclipse and provide images and movies that will be available on the NASA website.

"Due to Hinode’s orbit around the Earth, Hinode will actually observe four separate partial eclipses," it said.

NASA noted scientists often use an eclipse to help calibrate the instruments on the telescope by focusing in on the edge of the moon as it crosses the sun and measuring how sharp it appears in the images.

But it said an added bonus is that Hinode's X-ray Telescope will be able to provide images of the peaks and valleys of the lunar surface.

The orbits for NASA's Solar Dynamics Observatory (SDO), NASA's Solar Terrestrial Relations Observatory (STEREO), and the joint ESA/NASA mission the Solar Heliospheric Observatory will not provide them with a view of the eclipse. — LBG/HS, GMA News